


What stays and what fades away

by simplerplease



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Amortentia, Angst, Beauxbatons Student Draco Malfoy, Dealing With Trauma, Drinking, Hogwarts Eighth Year, Letters, Love Confessions, M/M, Pining, Therefore, Truth or Dare, epilogue? don’t know her, starts with hinny though sorry, ugly crying dense boys, yEs dRaCo sPEaKs fREnCH, yeah i’m a sucker for texting aus
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-01-30
Updated: 2019-10-18
Packaged: 2019-10-19 13:44:15
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 10
Words: 34,112
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17602457
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/simplerplease/pseuds/simplerplease
Summary: Instead of being dared to go try skinny dipping in the Great Lake or mess around with Filch, Harry has to write and send a love letter to the first person he fell in love with.It’s not Ginny Weasley. Not Cho Chang either. Thank fuck Draco Malfloy transferred to Beauxbatons for the Eigth Year.





	1. through the crowd i was crying out

**Author's Note:**

> enjoy

 

“Alright Harry,” the stare of Luna’s light blue eyes traced with millions of silver freckles falls onto Harry absently. “Truth or dare?”

 

The trunks are pushed back to free some space, but it’s still incredibly crowded in the room. The air is not that stale due to the high ceilings, but it’s so hot that little droplets of sweat roll down the necks and temples. Neville refuses to let them open the window, because Mrs Augusta Longbottom says, September wind is the most dangerous of all: you won’t even register the moment fever hops onto you. Behind the window the dark sky is nothing but a steady velvet drape, and millions of diamond pecks are placed so haphazardly, so chaotically on it, you wouldn’t be surprised if it’d turn out a child once grabbed handful of these sparkling pieces and threw them down, bursting into bright laughter. But each and every has its own place and is so big you wouldn’t believe it, so solid and fierce, so cold and beautiful, so blatantly important, and so heartbreakingly empty. No cloud hides them now, no light disturbs the sacred meaning of the night.

 

And yet, not even one person feels how small they actually are, too preoccupied with people, whose gazes are soft and dizzy from the consumed drinks and lips hurt from never ending smiles, in the room that’s dim from the last breaths of the fire, living the life they finally can afford. Finally.

 

“Dare,” Harry says after a long second and licks his lips. His t-shirt sticks to his back and glasses are constantly sliding down his nose. He hopes Luna makes him go outside and feed some mysterious invisible friends of hers.

 

The corners of Luna’s lips curl up in the slightest and her eyes roll up slowly, probably breaking through the ceiling and taking her high above the Earth to consult with the stars.

 

Meanwhile, everyone in the room begins to shout and thoughtfully share their own bright idea of how to humiliate Harry this time.

 

“Skinny dipping with the Giant Squid!”

 

“A lap dance!”

 

“Go steal another bottle of Firewhiskey from Filch’s study!”

 

“Y’all are weak,” Parvati snorts and opens her mouth to add something, but then Luna starts speaking again.

 

“Write and send a love letter to the first person you fell in love with.”

 

Ginny’s right there, her side pressed up against his, the smell of her hair, of her warm freckled body swallowing Harry up. Her lips curl into a smirk as she shoots a curious Cheshire-esque glare in Cho’s direction, who’s cheeks are a little darker than usual, but her smile is a little self-satisfied, too. Lavender bites her lip, Ron, Seamus and Neville make a lovely imitation of a hyena pack.

 

“Very funny, boys,” Hermione rolls her eyes and crosses her hands on her chest.

 

“This is going to be either teeth-rottingly cute or fucking embarrassing,” Neville shrieks, and then Ginny’s fingers are suddenly in Harry’s hair, her warm brown eyes trying to catch his gaze.

 

“Oh Merlin, get a room!”

 

Harry knows he’s under Veritaserum, so he couldn’t lie to himself as well, no matter how much he tries. Harry also knows it’s not going to be Ginny’s name on the letter.

 

He finally looks up and meets Luna’s eyes, so light they remind him of The Moon’s reflection in two giant poodles. They’re cool and calm, and yet, the panic trying to rise up in his chest is put down with the surprising amount of sympathy in them.

 

“You can do it somewhere else,” she says slowly, breaking the eye contact and opening her sixth or seventh bottle of Butterbeer.

 

Harry nods, mainly for himself, and finally turns to face Ginny. She’s wearing a little concerned frown, and Harry gives her a lopsided grin and a quick peck on the lips before standing up.

 

“He’s fucking plastered,” Dean snorts as Harry walks towards his bag to get a quill and a piece of parchment.

 

“So what if I am,” Harry asks over his shoulder without a question in his voice.

 

He’s followed with series of giggles and honest to god barks, and when Harry closes the door and hides himself under the Cloak, the smile immediately falls from his face, but inside, his soul doesn’t nag anymore. He breathes out with an ease and then takes a deep breath, savouring the much cooler air of the Hogwarts’ corridors.

 

When Harry gets out of the building, he already feels small. He suddenly wonders if the sky would swallow him up and leave nothing in return, no one to face the blushing rise of the next day. It’s not black anymore, like it looked from the tower. It’s so deeply blue Harry feels he could drown.

 

The softest autumn breeze smells like slowly rotting leaves and warm earth, and Harry lets it kiss away the heat on his cheeks and neck. The grass tickles his ankles, his head is dizzy, and every single tree sounds different under the gentle touches of the wind.

 

The boy sits by the lake, where the strong smell of water and seaweed approaches the forest symphony. Millions of grey licks of waves wink at him from the surface of the Lake, although now _it_ is one to be black. So black Harry could reach down to its waters and never wash away the stains on his skin. So back Harry could use it to write the letter. So black Harry could drown himself in it, and his sorrow and guilt would dissolve completely.

 

***

 

_**Dear Draco,** _

__

_**they gave me Veritaserum, so I can’t make myself believe you weren’t the first one. That you weren’t one at all.** _

 

**Fuck. Shit.**

 

Harry rubs his eyes with his thumb and index finger. Takes a few deep breaths. Tries to sober up a little. The letters are wobbly and the flow of his words is even worse. He’s not in the right condition to _write_ , let alone starting all over again and again.

 

**This is not the best way to start a love letter.**

**Fucking mother fuck.**

 

He groans. Maybe it’s the wind, but something in the Lake groans too. Harry shivers.

 

**I was dared to write and send a letter to the first person I fell in love with. The person I’m currently in a relationship with was sitting next to me, and she probably still thinks I’m writing to her. The point is, I would’ve been, if I were 1 — sober; 2 — smart; 3 — a dirty rotten liar. But I’m drunk and stupid and under Veritaserum, so I can’t write to anyone but you.**

**I’m sitting by the Lake right now, because I remember how often I saw you here, alone.**

 

Not sneering. Not smirking or teasing. Long legs stretched, ankles crossed, pale fingers holding a quill. A little crease in between eyebrows. In the end, he was the second-best student, he studied a lot. And staring at him while he was concentrated and focused was sometimes better than bickering...and fighting.

 

**And how awful many times I saw the shade of your eyes in the mirror of its waters. I’ve never been the one to see your eyes up close often, but there were few times.**

**And now you’re not here at all.**

**I was mad at first when I learned you transferred to Beauxbatons after the war. Then I changed my mind because I had to move on. It’s a good thing. Loving you was not.**

 

Stupid, desperate and hopeless. Illogical, even. Fucking ridiculous.

 

**I hope you’re happy there.**

**Oh fuck.**

**You have no idea how many times I’ve tried to remind myselfthat you were a terrible person, the one that didn’t deserve to live, to love and to be loved, but I couldn’t. Again, I’m not a dirty rotten liar. And now I wish you happiness.**

 

**You did terrible things, but you had no choice. He would end your family. You loved, and that was what you did all those things in honour of. I don’t care if you think otherwise, if you hate yourself, if you think you don’t deserve anything good as well. I don’t care if you don’t feel guilty at all too. I don’t.**

**But I’ll let you know, even a year ago, I couldn’t make myself hate you. I mean, sometimes hated you a little because you were a git, because you acted like a complete wanker and made people feel bad for things they couldn’t change, etcetera, but. . .no. I could never hate you. Those things are not enough to hate.**

 

**In the end, why do I know I loved you?**

**You were always in my head, but never in colours that don’t exist. I have proofs now, you’re not a bad person. I can’t write what exactly made me develop those feelings towards you (sometimes I don’t think I know either), I don’t really want to reveal myself, in the end, my dare is to write to my first love, not to my current one; but you can trust my Veritaserum-poisoned self, I loved you.**

 

Harry stops writing again and lets himself fall back onto the cool ground, grabbing fistful of grass. His eyes are wide open, his chest rises and falls like he’s been playing Quidditch for four hours.

 

Not even one star moves, but it feels like they’re breathing. Harry wonders what would they smell like. Probably they don’t, they’re stones after all. But he doesn’t want to agree on that.

 

**This is probably the worst letter you’ve ever received. I know it doesn’t make sense, and to say it’s ill-structured would mean to say nothing at all. But I can’t write anyhow else. I can’t write as freely as I’d want to—**

 

The boy pauses and bites his lip. Yeah. Right. He can’t lie. He’d like to write a proper love letter. To celebrate the first person who broke his heart. He decides to not cross the sentence to avoid spreading more dirt.

 

**but it’s still something.**

**I hope you’re doing well. I hope you’re doing great and that you’ll never have to come back to face people that don’t know shit. I hope you don’t have nightmares but I know you do. I hope it’ll be better soon.**

**I hope I never see you again.**

**Best wishes,**

 

Harry hesitates. He can’t write a wrong name. He can’t leave it like that. Writing something like “Anonymous” feel stupid.

 

Harry. Harry James Potter. James. Jamie. Jem. 

 

 **Gem**

 

***

 

The ceiling is too far from being as beautiful as the night sky that he stared at for thirty more minutes before sending the letter, but Harry still can’t look away. It’s comforting after a round of nightly nightmares, leaving him all panting and breathless on sweaty covers of his bed. He doesn’t need to think much to remember who he’s just dreamt of.

 

Those thirty minutes were a mistake. He should’ve frozen his ass out and gone inside, immediately. He should’ve come back, gotten rid of the letter, tugged Ginny close and been lulled into sleep, surrounded by people he treasures the most.

 

Instead, Harry let his mind take him back to places he’s long forgotten. He let the night touch the secret chords he wished to forget.

 

It’s true, he hates thinking about his stupid crush. His obsession with Malfoy had never supposed to be what it was. An obsession with a vain, self-centered, cruel pure-blood. The Boy Who Lived and a Death Eater’s son. Later a Death Eater himself.

 

But even though Harry knows Malfoy took the mark, a part of his heart always refuses to call him a Death Eater. He was forced into this, and Harry should have thought better two years ago, he should’ve known this, he should’ve done something. Tell Dumbledore, tell anyone, stop this fuckery. He was a _child_. Harry’s stupid Hero complex and yet he’s never made any effort to save the person he admired so much. Harry knows for sure he shouldn’t feel sorry, it’s fucking ridiculous. Still.

 

As if he’s ever been good with telling his heart what to do.

 

The white light of the morning is dull, and it feels odd after the clearance of the night. It’s probably an aluminum-grey day, with watercolour smears of clouds above endless forests, but there’s a lot to admire in this particular kind of a day too. Especially in September, when all the leaves make a serious competition to Shishkin’s palette, thousands, millions of shades of brown, yellow, green and red. Under the sky of perfect baby blue they’re soft and almost creamy, under the bright blue of a sunny day they’re almost blinding in their retrospective; and this metal grey sky makes its own gloomy, stoic, yet melodramatically poetic charm when you look at the never-ending pano from the Gryffindor tower. It’s a much common view in October than mid-September, but some days are an exception.

 

This day won’t be an exception in any other way. He’ll come down to the Great Hall, have a breakfast, kiss Ginny on her adorably chapped pink lips, lie in her lap in the Common Room, write his Potions essay, play chess with Ron or a game of poker with Seamus. Or maybe a couple of games.

 

He suddenly feels sick to the guts. He often does, these days. He’s so fucking tired. Inside, there’s that lingering feeling of a trap. He’s like a tensed string, frantically waiting for a catch, ready to snap at every second, with every fiber of his being. It makes him weaker. More paranoid. It’s exhausting. He wants to have a rest.

 

The Mind Healer he used to visit quite often in summer said it was okay. But now he doesn’t have his Mind Healer, she said he was ready; she said he was better. He doesn’t need to save the world any more. It’s time to focus on himself.

 

He should focus on himself. He should make this day decent. He should keep fighting his apathy, caused by the constant tension inside. Quite a paradox.

 

But it’s Sunday. He Accios a glass, fills it up with Aguamenti, swallows the water quickly and falls asleep again.

 

***

 

“Mate? Mate, you okay?”

 

There’s a cool hand on his ankle, and Harry swears into his pillow, pulling his knee up to his chest.

 

Ron snorts.

 

“ ‘m fine, just sleeping,” Harry mutters, though it’s not entirely true. He’s woken up two times already, and this was just a nap that wouldn’t last long either.

 

“Is five in the evening.”

 

“And?”

 

“Dunno,” Harry can see him shrugging awkwardly. “Thought you were hungry. Gin’s worried.”

 

“Why?”

 

“She uh,” Ron probably twitches uncomfortably. “She—“

 

“Didn’t get the letter?”

 

Nothing but silence follows Harry’s bitterness.

 

“Anyway, thanks for checking up on me,  I’m coming.”

 

Ron exhales, and there is an unmistakable gratitude in the sound. Harry feels sorry for him.

 

***

 

The thought of getting an answer strikes Harry when he’s shoving the second piece of treacle tart into his mouth. The boy just frowns a little, still chewing, and then relaxes, because come on. The letter was atrocious. Draco will probably read it with an honest to god pitiful expression on his face, wondering what kind of “a fucking imbecile” would call it a love letter, and throw it away.

 

Not like Harry gives a shit.

 

“There you are.”

 

A faint sound of flowing fabric, a wave of citrusy shampoo and sweet late spring flowers blossom perfume, a radiating ginger silhouette — and Ginny’s right next to him, brown eyes still concerned, just like they were the last time Harry met them with his own.

 

Ginny’s comfort, Ginny’s peace, Ginny’s blissful safety of passive existence Harry’s trying to reach. Ginny reminds him of his mother. Of Molly, too. How many nights passed next to her, how many breaths stolen from her, how many heartbeats Harry counted while his head lied on her chest. It was good, having Ginny by his side. Good. Nice. Fine.

 

Harry lets a smile touch his sugary glistening mouth.

 

“Hi, Ginny.”

 

The smile grows sillier and wider when he sees her overcoming her own thoughts and finally giving in. She sighs and shakes her head a little, warm fingers cup either side of Harry’s face, and then her lips cover his. The bows inside Harry’s stomach don’t relax, his shoulders are still tensed, no white noise in his head; it’s clear, and right now he feels Ginny Weasley with every fiber of his being.

 

***

 

On Monday and Tuesday Harry looks through the window and sees how beautiful autumn’s last breaths are. Grass greener and greener under the beaming sun, but with a different green, not May-fresh or June-popping. It’s a kind of green you can find pressed in between the sheets of your heaviest book. This exact hue is escorted with ochre-yellows, with tea-oranges, with crimson-reds, if you trace the trees with a quick glance. And no swirl of white up the endless blue of the sky.

 

Wednesday reminds him of Sunday, although the picture in Harry’s head was only a presumption. V-formations of birds tremble in the distance, and the sky is completely grey, like a worn-out, one thousand times washed white sheet.

 

“I mean, I would totally bang him,” Lavender sighs dreamily at the sight of their new DADA teacher when they all are having breakfast in the Great Hall.

 

“No offense but you would bang anybody,” Seamus snorts, and the whole table follows. Ron’s mug is darker than the bowl of beet salad in front of him, which makes Hermione and Ginny laugh even harder.

 

“As if _you_ don’t have your eyes for him,” Lavender strikes back and grins when red blush spreads over Seamus’ cheeks and he looks apologetically at Dean.

 

“Honey, sugar, love of my life, you know she’s joking, right?” he mutters weakly, though Dean seems to have absolutely no problem with that.

 

“It’s okay love, I find him totally bangable too,” one more round of laughter follows after that.

 

And when Harry’s eyes reach the familiar spot at the Slytherin table, now taken by some sixth grader he doesn’t know, it shows. His eyes turn into glass and his smile, still spread on his lips, looks as if it’s made of wax.

 

After classes, when the air is cool and humid, and slowly begins to fall into softer shades of lilac, Harry, Ginny, Luna and Neville are making their way into the forest. Luna wants to find the bushes of blackcurrant, the tea of its leaves is her favourite. Harry falls behind her and Neville, taking his time and breathing deeply, head free of thoughts, and Ginny sticks to his slow wandering steps. Looking at the leaves from the ground is different. The darkening veins of trees form giant nests for trillions of creatures, their cries and whispers mixing with the symphony of wind and their steps.

 

“Did you get an answer?”

 

Ginny’s voice sounds out of place. Anyone’s would. With an exception of maybe Hagrid’s. Or Luna’s. 

 

“Huh?”

 

Ginny clears her throat. Harry still doesn’t look at her, but not because of fear or reluctance. He’s too drowned in watching.

 

“Your dare. Your love letter. Did you get an answer?”

 

“No. I don’t think I will.”

 

They fall into cool silence after that, until Luna starts rambling excitedly somewhere near them. Harry picks up the blackcurrant leaves one by one and his fingers still smell like them when he’s falling asleep that night.

 

 


	2. a revelation in the light of day

“Did you know Slughorn wants to start the whole Slug club fuckery again?” Ron says at breakfast while loading his plate with a rather impressive amount of food.

Harry just stares into the distance, not even bothered to pretend he’s interested. He’s too tired for this. He has no idea why he woke up at this ungodly hour on Sunday, too. Maybe because he just can’t let go of that one miserably small part of him that wants a reply. Not because it matters, but because it’s unfair, to open up in front of someone like that, even anonymously, and then be ignored. For people, their feelings are the most essential and sensitive things, and no one would like to experience that kind of disrespect towards them  

“I think it’s not a bad idea,” Hermione points out. “To cheer up the the students, maybe?”

“It was such an odd experience,” Luna says and smiles to herself. Harry then looks at her, she’s chopping her lemons peacefully to add them into her fruit salad.

“Did you make your tea?” Harry asks then, voice still a little rough from sleep and wordlessness.

She looks up at him, surprisedly.

“Of course I didn’t, not yet.”

Harry presses his lips together and looks down into his plate.

“I need to find pomegranate blossom flowers, you know,” she says then, and Harry meets her gaze, dissolving in the chaotic energy of her mind, again. “Do you want to go to Hogsmeade with me?”

“Are you...are you sure we can find pomegranate blossom flowers in Hogsmeade?” Harry asks, but not because he doesn’t want to go. He would love to, actually. Talking to Luna has always been one of his soft spots, his favourite soft spots.

“Of course I’m not,” she says, trying to reach out to the teapot. It’s closer to Harry, and he picks it up and pours the tea into Luna’s cup. “Thank you, Harry. But there is that Turkish wizard I know, he owns a little tea shop there. Maybe we should visit him.”

Harry nods and finally decides on poached eggs and a cheese toast. His eyes of course drift away to Draco’s former spot at the Slytherin table, but this time he at least has an explanation. Poached eggs were Draco’s favourite.

Luna begins to slice one more lemon.

***

They do find the dried pomegranate blossom flowers in that shop, and the owner, Mr Taryck Dilér, makes them drink a pot of chamomile, rose and pomelo tea, because “the boy seems tensed and you Luna are a delight to have around”. He tells them about the process of wandering around turkish cities, trying to find the cheapest and most decent ingredients for his teas, and that it’s not easier than picking all of them from the trees with his own hands. He does it, too, in the season, but not one of his products remains at the shop for a long time, Mr Diler says with pride in his voice and fondness in his wrinkled eyes, so he has to “go shopping” most of the times.

“I’m going to have baklava and the tulumba dessert two weeks later, come see me before they turn too soft,” he cries with a smile before closing the door after them, and Luna tells Harry about turkish desserts and spells to keep Blibbering Humdingers away from teapots.

They walk in silence after that, shrill light of autumn sun waving goodbye from the back; their shadows long and dark in front of them. When Harry looks at Luna, she’s smiling with a quiet, delicate smile and her eyes are facing the road, darker when no light hits them. Her hair looks white, almost surreal, and Harry winces and looks away.

The way Draco’s hair was gleaming in the sun. The way he let its rays lick his face when it wasn’t hot or warm — only when it was cool and delicate. The way it sharpened his ivory-carved skin, his pointed jaw and cheekbones throwing deep shadows on the rest of his face,  
scarlet lips burning. Grey eyes cool, but alive, like thunder clouds. Beautiful.

“Maybe he misses you too.”

Harry chokes on his own breath then and trips over his own feet, having to pull his hands from the pockets of his jacket to steady himself. Luna laughs sympathetically, but keeps walking. She’s still smiling when Harry stares at her in disbelief, with that surreal absence of hers.

There are questions lingering in Harry’s head, but he doesn’t know how to ask. What to ask. A couple of minutes pass, and he decides to let go. After all, Luna is the rightest person to share a comfortable silence with. And if there’s a little sorrow in both their faces, it’s right, too. A peaceful and long accepted sorrow that Harry’s gotten used to now.

***

On Monday Harry gets an owl with Hagrid’s note to come visit him after classes and on Tuesday he falls asleep in his bed doing homework. Wednesday’s dreadful, as always, because the fact that this day exists is just weird, and on Thursday morning Harry wakes up and thinks about quitting Hogwarts so he could sleep more. His night routine is just him waking up, wondering if those pictures he’s just seen were real, then realizing they were not, then trying to fall back to sleep, succeeding...and then again. Let’s be honest, Harry thinks of quitting Hogwarts at least twice a day. He sure as fuck won’t though. Not because he doesn’t have a choice, but because it doesn’t feel right.

So he gets up, takes a look through the window, and his reflection doesn’t look impressed with the width of the sapphire sky and burning leaves. These are the last days of this fire, though. Even yesterday the leafage looked more pompous than today.

At the doors he gets a peck on the lips from Ginny who’s leaving already to finish her homework before classes and sits down between Luna and Hermione. It’s too bright in the Hall for his liking, but not like he can do anything about that.

Harry’s staring at the Slytherin table at random, not giving two fucks about Ron going on and on about that Quiddich scholarship Ginny considers to accept, when something falls right into his porridge.

“Oh sweet Merlin,” Hermione chuckles next to him as Harry watches a big grey own landing exhaustedly on the table. Her eyeleads are heavy, and Harry reaches out to stroke her feathers with one hand, quickly pulling the letter out of the porridge and grabbing the goblet with water to offer to the bird with the other.

“ _Scourgify_ ,” Hermione whispers, her wand pointed to the letter, and her eyes meet Harry’s for a brief second with a very odd expression.

“She seems fucking dead, mate,” Neville points out observantly, and Harry nods, grabbing the letter with suddenly incredibly fast heart rate and mumbling something about taking her to Hagrid. The poor creature blinks at him with gratitude when there’s no water left in the goblet, and maneuvers onto Harry’s forearm.

The way out is too long and too short at the same time. Harry’s palms are clammy, he constantly stumbles on his robes, the way his stomach clenches is a nice throw-up promise. The only thing keeping him from running towards Hagrid as fast as he can is the bird who’s trembling feathers tickle his jaw.

***

 _Every single second_ filled with Trelawney’s deep voice, the sound of Hermione’s quill scribbling agains the parchment, Dean’s incredibly loud breaths and half-imaginary sound of his own beating heart is a torture. The blue envelope makes an impossibly hard weight in Harry’s pocket, and the boy feels both physically and mentally exhausted when the last lesson ends and they’re all standing up.

He professionally ditches every single one of his friends and returns to their empty dorm, literally _shivering_ with anticipation. An hour should be enough to read a letter. Maybe even more if they all go to the Common Rooms after dinner.

Harry’s not scared; he’s fucking terrified. Terrified, but his hands are not shaking when he opens the letter. For a second, he completely forgets how to breathe.

_Potter,_

_Your drunk handwriting is far worse than your letter. But there is no way I wouldn’t recognize it, maybe because the way you usually write is just a tiny bit more pleasant to read._

And Harry has to re-read these two sentences thrice and then once again just to make sure his eyes are not lying to him.

When he does, he drops his hands down and looks up blindly, finally letting go of breath he didn’t know he was holding. He wishes he wouldn’t, though, because the only thing he craves more than a Time-Turner right now is a quick and painless death.

Harry Potter, The Boy Who Lived Twice, the boy who killed Voldemort, etcetera, is on a verge of the second heartbreak; caused by the same person.

That’s the tragic charm of the first love. How many more we’ll have — we won’t ever know, but that first person will always be there, like a blessing, like a curse, like a promise. It’s a delicate and incredibly fragile spot underneath one’s soul and above one’s head, a spot which is painfully pleasant to the touch, unique and everlasting; immortal.

Harry has no idea how on the Earth he managed to make Draco Malfoy this person. But the moment this thought crosses his mind, something else, something stronger and harder wakes up. Something warm, protective over the grey eyes and rich voice and lonely, lonely heart.

_“Maybe he misses you too.”_

Harry digs his teeth into his bottom lip and swallows.

_Let’s keep being honest: I’m not even sure you’re waiting for an answer, and yet I feel obliged to send one. (I tried to ignore you; it didn’t take)_

Harry feels a smile tugging gently at the corners of his lips, and the wave of agony and terror slowly begins to back down.

_Personally I wouldn’t be very happy to not get one after this kind of a_

Harry chuckles at the little change in Draco’s handwriting that looks an awful lot like he stopped writing for a couple of seconds, in doubt, and then continued.

_message. Even if the answer itself would be short and pretty much meaningless._

_First of all, I hope I’ll never be back again, too. I like it here. Breathing’s easier. And, unlike England, France is not a country of hypocrites. I’d invite you to visit me sometime, but I hope I never see you again, too._

 

Yeah, though Harry meant it because he knows he could easily fall again and Draco probably just hates him. But after reading the next sentence, Harry just wants to slap himself.

 

_Too many times I had to face you in my dreams, unfortunately. And not the brightest ones._

 

_Yes, you got me at nightmares. I’m really sorry you also have them, but I guess that’s inevitable. There’s a turkish wizard in Hogsmeade, his name’s Taryck Dilér. Ask him to make you the Sleeping Tea, he’ll know what you mean. I’m afraid it won’t help much, but a little help is better than none at all._

 

_For the record, I do feel guilty. Nothing’s gonna change what I’ve done, some things stay with us forever, for there is a reason they say “actions have consequences”. I’m sure we could have a lovely conversation about that, but there’s no need to; we both know what we have to know._

 

_Hope your little Weaslette is not too upset about not getting the letter. And that you’ll not get into trouble for receiving a reply; it’s a one-time thing after all, so no need to worry._

 

_I also promise I won’t tell anyone about either of the letters. This subject is too embarrassing to make fun of it._

 

Harry can’t help rolling his eyes, but his cheeks redden on the instant.

 

_Good luck with N.E.W.Ts and everything else. Don’t get caught playing truth or dare too, Potter, some sad boy sitting dreamily by the Great Lake in the middle of the night won’t look that adorable to any of the Professors (except maybe Slughorn), let alone Filch, you helpless fucking imbecile._

 

 _On this cheerful note,_  
_Goodbye Potter._

 

_D. Malfoy_

 

It’s almost like he’s intendedly provoking Harry, and he can’t help but picture his arrogantly lifted up chin and lips curved up in a smirk, grey eyes laughing, stormily and daringly. It feels surreally familiar, although it’s been too long since he’s seen it; since anyone, actually, has seen it. But anyone wouldn’t bother much to notice the change in this boy, following the beginning of their sixth year at Hogwarts.

 

The familiar feeling of guilt starts building up Harry’s chest. The sixth year; the year that changed everything and the year he himself changed nothing, although he could.

 

Harry used to think he noticed everything, until he realized he did not at all.

 

Harry’s heart aches in a bittersweet manner, but it’s nothing he was expecting to experience after opening the envelope. He wonders if he should connect their walk to Hogsmeade with Luna and Draco’s advice and what exactly he does dream of. He wonders whether it’s really the last time they communicate with each other. He wonders if he’ll see the boy again.

 

The letter is still in his clammy palms when the boys’ noises begin rising up in the distance. Harry decides he’s mature and over it all enough to shrug it off and continue living the life he’s been dreaming of living for a long time. It had to be done, the confession. And Merlin only knows how lucky he is to walk through this with a minimum of heartache.

 

***

 

 

 

It’s been a week since the huge grey owl with exhausted amber eyes threw the letter in Harry’s porridge, and the devastation seems to only be growing.

 

There’s no need to take Veritaserum for Harry to admit he had been waiting for it, and now he’s messed up and bad, and sad, and mad, too. Mad at himself, sad because it’s like he’s Dudley who’s just gotten 57 best Christmas presents ever and now doesn’t have anything else to want and to hope for; bad because he constantly has to force himself into doing something. Under everlasting pressure, one’s mind gets tired, and the pressure only lightens up under one’s mind.

 

Playing it all off is a good idea; he fails miserably at it.

 

“We survived a war, for fuck’s sake,” Ron groans one evening and drops his quill. “And now the profs are trying to kill us with homework! The audacity!”

 

Hermione rolls his eyes and Harry says nothing, still looking at the lake from the window. The poudre-lilac clouds slowly begin to overtake the evening sky, traces of golden pink only kiss the mountain chain the sun has just disappeared behind. Dull grey has already swollen the entire cascade of trees, and the smoke from Hagrid’s hut lingers in delicate veiny-blue swirls over it.

 

“Harry, have you finished your essay already?”

 

“Yesterday.”

 

He earns a gasp of surprise escaping Hermione’s lips, but it’s followed with Ron’s short snort.

 

“Yeah, because you had the audacity to not joining us yesterday at Ravenclaw dorms.”

 

“Is that your favourite word now?”

 

Hermione chuckles and Harry needn’t look at Ron to know he goes all red.

 

“Mate, what’s wrong? You’ve been distant for too long now, is everything alright?”

 

“What do you mean ‘for too long’?”

 

“Well, you usually brood for a couple of days and come back cool, but now it’s been three weeks and you still look as if you’ve been Kissed.”

 

“Ronald!”

 

Harry sighs.

 

“Seriously, Harry, we’re worried, Gin’s worried, everyone is.”

 

Ginny. Right.

 

“I’m fine. Nothing happened. I’m just tired, that’s all.”

 

“It’s probably because of the lack of sleep,” Hermione mutters, and Harry makes a mental note to visit the Turkish wizard tomorrow, during their Hogsmeade visit. That he’s going to spend with his girlfriend.

 

It doesn’t go all too bad the next day, at least that’s what Harry’s thinking when the two of them are walking down the road in comfortable silence. It’s quiet and cool, and the the air drowns them in a cold blue haze. All the leaves are brown and in a week all of them will be sputtered on the ground.

 

“Harry, do you want to break up with me?”

 

Ginny’s voice is unnaturally loud and it makes Harry wince a little.

 

“Err, what? Why?”

 

She shrugs under his gaze, her own is long lost in the distance.

 

“It feels like you do.”

 

“Ginny,” Harry says carefully. “I can think of no reasons for doing this.”

 

Her breath comes out in a pale cloud of steam and she stops, looking down.

 

“You’ve been distant lately.”

 

“I know, I know, I’m sorry. I know,” he looks at her hair, the wind traces long ginger locks delicately. “But I sweat, it has nothing to do with you.”

 

“Then what is it?”

 

“I don’t know,” Harry answers honestly. “Maybe just some kind of an autumn depression.”

 

She chuckles miserably.

 

“Harry, you’ve been like that since the summer. But now it’s just...growing.”

 

They stand there silent for a couple of long moments, looking at each other, wearing completely different expressions.

 

“I don’t know what’s going on with me, Gin. I’ll understand if you tell me you’re sick of tolerating me, but—“

 

“No,” she cries and shakes her head. “I don’t want to break up. I’m just worried.”

 

Worried. She’s always worried about him, and he lets her, that’s the essential in their relationship. She may be one of the fiercest Quidditch players, of the fearless and smartest witches he knows, but she also carries the biggest heart in her chest, the heart that aches and cares for her beloved ones. She’s so much like her mother, and Harry admires this a lot in her. Therefore, a soft smile touches his lips when he reaches out to connect their hands.

 

“I’m fine, Ginny. I’m going to be fine. Don’t worry.”

 

He’s not lying. Not really. He’s going to try to make it work, because that’s what she deserves. It’s not her problem that he’s a little fuck up. It’s completely on him.

 

***

 

They meet Seamus, Dean, Hermione and Ron at Three Broomsticks and after two bottles of butterbeer Harry excuses himself and goes to the tea shop.

 

“Ah, good evening, young gentleman,” the old turkishman says when Harry enters it, breathing in the strong scent of weeds and dried fruit. “How can I help you today?”

 

“Hello, sir, I was wondering if you have the, um, the Sleeping Tea?” he offers a little unsurely, but meets no hesitation.

 

“Of course we do! Why, does Miss Luna have troubles sleeping again?”

 

He says Luna’s name a little differently, placing the accent to the ‘a’ and making it linger, so it’s ‘Lunaa’ and not ‘Loona’. Harry decides it sounds rather nice.

 

“Oh, no, it’s for me,” Harry says sheepishly. “I didn’t know she was struggling with it too.”

 

“I hope she doesn’t, now,” Mr Diler says, shifting towards the shelves. “She’s such a sweet creature...” he sighs with a delicate father-like smile. “And who told you about my tea, then, may I ask? Not a lot of students are familiar with my products. Lots of you just stick to the Dreamless Sleep Potion.”

 

Harry chuckles then, following the wizard’s smile. His big nose is bigger when he does and the wrinkles by his dark eyes, framed with even darker eyebrows, grow deeper.

 

“The Dreamless Sleep Potion is addictive, I’ve heard. And um, Draco Malfoy told me about your tea.”

 

Bushy eyebrows jump up in recognition, and his smile only turns into a bit more surprised one.

 

“Drahco!” he cries, pronouncing the name in the same manner as Luna’s. “Of course it was him. I’m so glad he still has friends among the students.”

 

Harry’s cheeks start burning, but he still nods.

 

“Poor boy, I still owl him my tea, and even though I love my regular customers, I would be so happy if his sleep normalizes one day. He’s been my client for over two years now... Allahym yaarabbim, how fast the days change each other...”

 

The lump in Harry’s throat grows bigger and bigger as he watches the man packing and wrapping up his tea. One part of him desperately wants to ask the man more about Draco and the other is so weak that he knows it could hardly handle the information.

 

“Here’s your tea, young man, two galleons, please, for your first try.”

 

The boy, still shaken a little, pays for the tea and can’t help but hesitate a little before turning towards he door, not really keen on leaving.

 

“By the way,” thankfully, Mr Diler speaks, “are you familiar with saalep? The Autumn here is as cold as winters in Istanbul, so I was just making it for myself.”

 

“Uh,” Harry breaths out and lets the man enthusiastically tell him about the traditional turkish winter drink, made from orchids and milk. He learns that not only it does warm up one’s body and spirit, it also heals cough, bronchitis and diarrhea due to the medical powers of orchids.

 

“Nothing in my shop contains magic,” the man laughs, turning the fire off and pulling out a little copper kettle. “But everything has its special powers. Do you like cinnamon? It’s so much better with cinnamon.”

 

“Does cinnamon have special powers too?”

 

“Of course it does! That’s why saalep’s grows stronger when it’s added. I can’t explain it, but that is that. If it was bullshit, yavrum, no one would believe it for more than ten centuries.”

 

“Sorry...what was that?”

 

“What was what?”

 

“The, um...yaav—“

 

“Yavrum?”

 

“Yeah.”

 

Mr Diler laughs again, and Harry thinks this laugh is one of the greatest laughs he’s ever heard. Greatest, that’s the right word for it. Loud, and unashamed, and filled with incredibly strong energy.

 

“Yavru originally means an animal’s baby, but in Turkey we say it to anyone who’s younger. Think of it as of the English “my boy”.

 

“Okay,” Harry nods and blows a little on his steaming drink. Mr Diler lights up a muggle cigarette right in the room and asks what’s his name.

 

***

 

The night of Wednesday is particularly cold and uncomfortable, and after lying in his bed for an hour or more, Harry decides to go down to the kitchens and drink the tea for the first time.

 

He doesn’t know if it helps, but it’s delicious and his hair smells faintly like it when he goes back to the dorms, so Harry falls asleep, the thought of writing a thank-you letter appearing somewhere in his mind as quickly as it disappears.

 

He wakes up with a much stronger version of it.

 

Something childishly impatient buzzes on his fingertips and the tips of his ears at breakfast. It feels like he’s planning a mischief, and oh it is good. Hermione gives him a weird look over the book at their Charms lesson and he grins in return.

 

When on Monday the idea is still there, strong and vibrant, and Mcgonagall says he hasn’t seen him looking that healthy in months, he decides to go for it. In the end, it’s not like there’s something wrong with writing one more letter to Draco. If it makes Harry excited, if some bloody sense finally appears in his stupid life, why the fuck not? A kingdom for a reason against sending a letter to Draco Malfoy (okay not like Harry can’t think of at least four, but he ignores them anyway).

 

He writes it in the library, with ears burning so hot it almost hurts, carefully ignoring the subject of the way it was so pathetic of him to suppose Draco would really not recognize his fucking handwriting. And, in the end, there's nothing to say too, all he could do is to thank Draco for delicately...not roasting the living shit out of him. 

 

**Dear Draco,**

 

**hello again.**

 

**I’m not drunk or dared this time, just wanted to say thank you for recommending me that tea. I don’t drink it every day, only when it’s all too bad to handle on my own, and I really, really don’t know if it does any help, but the taste is amazing and so is the smell. Mr Diler, with whom I’ve been conversing for maybe two hours, was also a delight. He cares about you deeply. But don’t tell him that I told you, I don’t want to seem like a gossip.**

 

Suddenly Harry feels unsure. What if he finally gets ignored after that, what if Malfoy thinks he’s pathetic, what if—no, no anxiety attacks this time, Potter.

 

Of course people don’t change, but Draco’s not a scared and lost little boy now. They grow up. It was one letter and way too few paragraphs, but there’s much more in him. Maybe they could be friends. Maybe they would finish it after a letter or two. But Draco Malfoy has never been and will never be an empty shell; and if he’s been attracting Harry so much with his problematic and fucking unbearable self for seven goddamn years...

 

Harry’s dying to learn what’s there now. A part of him suggests that it may be a dull inexpressive snob that acts good just to be polite for his own good. And another part is screaming devilishly ‘suck it and see, Scarhead’.

 

**By the way, the owl you sent was at death’s door when arrived. I’ll ask Hagrid which one would be fine with international delivery, but you should do something about it too, if you...if you decide to send me an answer. I mean, with another owl.**

 

Harry bites his lip nervously but decides to not cross the paragraph. If Draco decides it sounds pathetic, okay. But Harry rather reads it in his letter, not in his own feverish mind.

 

**There was a Gryffindor/Hufflepuff game a couple of days ago and I was wondering if you still play Quidditch there. They don’t let us play, we’re supposed to be drowned in intensive studies for our exams. Of course we go play sometimes, in little teams or just Seeker matches, but it’s not that exciting.**

 

He desperately wants to write that he wonders if Draco could beat him in one-to-one game.

 

**Wait. Mr Diler said he owls you the tea. It means you know the right birds. Or...he does. Maybe I should ask him.**

 

**Why, no, Hagrid’s great. Besides, Mr Diler may (or may not) think we’re best friends or something, so it would be weird of me to ask.**

 

**He says things in Turkish sometimes and it sounds beautiful but a little bit terrifying, too. I guess it’s okay because don’t we all always panic when we have to face something we’re not familiar with. I was unsure about the orchid and milk drink he offered me, sayleph? I think, but it turned out to be rather amazing.**

 

**You don’t have to answer any of my questions or write me back, by the way. I understand if you’d want to block everything reminding you of the war and I’m not writing this because I want to be polite. I can’t say this wouldn’t upset me but**

 

Harry bites his lip and crosses the last sentence so good that no parchment is seen through the smears of black ink.

 

**Sorry. My hand slipped.**

 

_Helpless fucking idiot._

 

**Anyway, have a nice week, I guess? And no, I’m not playing truth or dare again, thank you very much. Too many unsuspected consequences after that one.**

 

**Best wishes,**

 

**Harry Potter**

 

For some reasons Harry can’t explain, he feels sheepish sending the letter with a little almost jet-black owl the day after. Hagrid said that big Barn Owls get tired too quickly, and if the package is not large it’d be better to use the small but quick Little Owls instead.

 

And yet, staring at the bird until it’s nothing but a little black dot in the white lifeless sky, Harry feels a wave of joy making its way over his skin, too.

 

“You look better, Harry,” Luna says when they’re walking down the hill towards Hagrid’s pumpkins. Halloween’s approaching, and orange giants keep growing in size. Harry shrugs. He only decides he likes letting Luna walk with him because she doesn’t ask any questions.

 

“I think I sleep better. I don’t know.”

 

He tells her about the tea and thankfully she doesn’t wonder how he learned about it. Instead, she tells him how she was looking for mandrake tea and the only non-magical place to sell it was Mr Diler’s shop.

 

“Is he not a wizard?” Harry asks then, not sure if he wanted to know about mandrake tea.

 

“Mr Diler? Oh, he is. I bet a good one, too, since he believes to feel magic in absolutely non-magical things. He thinks cigarette smoke keeps away the Nargles,” she laughs and traces her hand over a pumpkin. “I so want a pumpkin pie.”

 

Unlike many other voices, hers does really not disturb the atmosphere around. It’s cold to the point of hiding hands in the pockets, and the leaves under their shoes crunch. The branches are naked. Somewhere deeper in the forest Thestrals are moving slowly. Luna’s hair looks almost blue-ish, and her skin is nothing but silky lavender undertones, except for her cheeks that blossom in rosy rosy blush. There are distant yelps coming from the Quidditch pit, one of the teams must be practicing. Harry wonders when did he become so fond of long walks.

 


	3. want to get it right

Harry has strong feelings about Ginny. He is comfortable with her, she makes him feel cozy and secure, and loved, which is also extremely important, but having sex with her always leaves Harry weird and confused, and he always slightly hates himself after that.

He’s a teenager. His body reacts hungrily to the touches of little warm hands and plump lips; reacts to the press of petite yet strong body and impressive curves against him. But something still goes missing every time, and that’s the problem. Something’s missing in his head, something that would make him react to whispers cried in trembling voice, to the sparkles in hazel eyes, to smiles and kisses that are supposed to be shared. Maybe the problem is that he’s known Ginny since she was ten and getting his dick hard to the thought of the person that’s practically his sister is weird; maybe it’s for a completely different and much more complicated reason: maybe the way she throws herself so selflessly on him makes Harry lose the excitement and passion...he doesn’t know. But he always, always feels as if he’s just used her, and not just her but her body to get off; and it’s fucking wrong. Who the hell thinks that of a person you’re supposed to be in love with?

And it takes about an hour under the steaming hot water to scrub this the fuck away, at least a little bit, at least until there’s none of her sweat left on his body, until the proofs of his crime are gone with soaped water. It would be a lie to say that it was as bad as their first times, but it’s still there. Harry hopes patiently for the best.

Later, when he comes back to the empty dorms with only Ginny stretched on his bed in blissful sleep, he doesn’t force himself into laying beside her, it makes him feel in peace with himself actually, listening to her quiet breath. Knowing that she’s alright and unconsciously pleased with the act. Yeah, it _has_ to be better after some time.

And even more hours later, when Neville’s struggling with the Potions homework and Ron curses under his breath after probably the twentieth try of performing the new Charms spell, when Dean and Seamus are long asleep cuddled up on the latter’s bed, there’s a soft knock on the window.

Harry immediately lets the bird with a light blue envelope in, as well as the cool autumn chill that sends shivers down his spine, caressing his bare neck and playing with his hair. Fresh smell of thunder is heavy, filling up his chest, and in the mirror of his glasses no star winks at the castle; all gone behind dirty greenish-grey limestone clouds. The wind fills up every single path in the forest, shaking even the oldest and strongest giant pine trees, and the hills far far away suddenly pop up in blinding silver under a hit of lighting. Harry wants to lick them.

Ron looks up at him and, thankfully, snorts.

“I’ll never forget that time you got a letter from the Ministry at four in the morning and the bloody bird made sure to wake up every single one of us but you.”

Harry chuckles and it’s the best scenario in which no one notices how particularly excited his eyes go.

“Does anyone have like, something to eat?” he asks, letting the owl have a seat on his forearm. She looks okay, a little tired but just fine. “I’ll take her to the kitchens then, I’m rather hungry myself. Anyone wants something?”

“I’d go with you but I have to finish this fuckery,” Ron sighs. “I wouldn’t mind a sandwich or two, though.”

“And for me too,” Neville joins, and Harry just nods, already throwing the Invisibility Cloak on.

_Potter,_

_after your monologue about owls, Mr Diler and Hagrid I think I shouldn’t even bother to point out that you’re fucking stupid. But why, for the love of Merlin, does Mr Diler think we’re best friends?_

_And of course we would have known each other if I had gone to Beauxbatons (like Mother wanted me to, but unfortunately Father and his former employer had different plans), we actually met at Madam Malkin’s before September 1st, do you not remember? I’m pained, Potter, utterly heartbroken._

Harry swallows a bittersweet lump in his throat from this whole paragraph. It sounds like a satyr, like a cruel joke, although it’s not, and...god. Must be a natural fucking talent. Harry even sees the familiar moue on pink curved lips.

_We do play Quidditch here, but it’s not the only self-developing lesson here. There are Quidditch, dancing, drawing and music lessons, and the art of theater too. You can pick anything out of them._

And of course the motherfucking son of a bitch didn’t write which ones he had chosen.

Whatever. Good for Harry. More material for the third letter.

Harry winces when the owl breaks a dead mouse’s, the one of that Elves got her, spine.

_It’s saalep, not saylep or whatever you scribbled down. Yes, its taste is divine, I definitely feel jealous of you right now, as I unfortunately am not going to have it anytime soon._

_I like it when he speaks Turkish. It sounds different from all the European languages, and I believe it is rather emotional. There is something in the way the words sound, not just the way_ he _pronounces them. Next time you go there, ask_ _Mr Diler to teach you how to curse in Turkish. I think you’ll understand what I mean perfectly._

_Now...Potter. If I don’t want to answer you, I won’t._

He’s getting pissy, Harry can feel this. He so hates to be bossed around.

_Thanks for compassion, but it would be terrible of me to try to forget everything about the war. Especially you. Wouldn’t want to be left off without a role model, would I?_

And of course Harry’s cheeks are immediately pomegranate-stained, burning with a deep, rich crimson above the frantically beating heart.

_And please, Potter, if you’re planning on keeping writing me love letters, would you please care to at least let the ink dry before folding the pages? I wouldn’t want to break my vision trying to make out the actual words behind the stains, thank you very much._

_Wishing you a happier week too._

_With best regards,_

_D. Malfoy_

_P.S. Maybe one day when you make it to the Head Auror, there would be a chance to meet someone as good at Quidditch as I am in the opposite team at some charity match...but I wouldn’t look too forward to that, for obvious reasons._

So, it’s official. Harry has an official permission to send Draco Malfoy letters. He would immediately write one, but the owl who has just finished her feast gives him a passive-aggressive sleepy look and the way to the Owlery would be a long one, so he just grabs boys’ sandwiches and returns to the dorms with a ridiculously huge grin on his face.

He remembers playing with Draco. Even though out of ten he’d catch six Snitches, Draco’s four is already fucking good. He’s always been the biggest competition for Harry, whether his play was clean or dirty.

Until the sixth year when he was so indifferent to everything that he quit even Quidditch. Yeah, the most wonderful year of all. The year Harry had to learn that a heart can not only be broken by someone; it can break _for_ someone as well. That seing the one you love in so much pain, undeserved, involuntary, cruel to the point of being almost impossible, in so much pain that means an inevitable change of that one’s whole being, might also crash you, crash and make sure you never come back to your old self again, too.

Suddenly Harry feels sick. Grey-eyed, full-lipped blond, unhealthily pale, unfamiliarly calm, sitting at the table, his cup of tea no longer steaming, ears so longer hearing anyone; anything. Another boy right in front of him, even dark wild hair can’t hide the stare of green eyes and furrowed eyebrows; shoulders tensed, hands clenched, omelette long forgotten as well.

“Good night everyone.”

Harry almost winces when Neville turns off the lights with a flick of his wand. He turns to face the wall and closes his eyes, praying to fall asleep quickly.

***

**Dear Draco,**

**maybe if you hadn’t been that high up your ass you would’ve beaten me at least once, but...yeah.**

**Maybe...okay I’m tired, I’ll just let you take the piss.**

**He thinks we’re best friends because when I asked for the tea he wondered who I learned about it from. I don’t think that telling him that we used to be arch-enemies from the first day of school, that I still somehow managed to fall for you a while later, that last year we happened to save each other’s lives on occasion and that you wrote an awkward answer to my even more awkward love-confession would be a great idea; even with his tea somewhere in the middle of all that.**

**And yeah, sorry for the mess of ink. I’ll do my best to avoid it. Your eyesight is far too precious. You fucking insufferable moron, at least tell me which discipline did you choose. Please? I won’t lie (well I suppose I don’t really have to), I’m quite ignorant, I haven’t been taken to any museums or galleries, let alone theaters and conservatories, so I’ve never been into...art. We don’t know, maybe I have the potential of Michelangelo.**

**Fuck wait, do you know Michelangelo? See, I don’t even know if the Wizarding world and the Muggle world share...it all.**

**I absolutely can’t disagree, Turkish is an emotional and sensitive towards the speaker’s feelings. I’ll definitely ask Mr Diler to swear in Turkish, but only after I figure out how to do this smoothly so he doesn’t think I’m a complete fuckup.**

He is, actually.

**Is it warm there? I’m not sure where exactly Beauxbatons is, so I have no idea what you see through your windows. I wish I’d go to some foreign school because wouldn’t it be cool to experience something different than Hogwarts, though I don’t think anything is as good. For me, at least.**

**By the way, I’m not trying to make a small-talk about the weather because I don’t know what to write about; I’m genuinely interested. There’s nothing I can tell you about the weather here, though.**

_Except it reminds me of you a lot_ , Harry thinks, _but I’m not gonna tell you this._

**Hoping to hear from you soon,**

**Harry Potter**

Thoughts are circulating in Harry’s head like birds in the Owlery as he watches the evening slowly slide into nighttime. Harry’s breaths come out in slightly golden steam, it mirrors the distant horizon where the owl with his letter has just disappeared. For some reasons, the evening sky, with so many clouds and colours, so many emotions looks lighter than the heavy crystal clear blue bliss of the afternoon. Some beauty is boring and worth looking at once a day. Some deserves every bit of attention from the beginning to the very death of it.

The sound of someone’s steps behind Harry hits him before the smell of Hermione’s perfume. She sits next to him and sighs, her skin turns dark golden, her glistening eyes are almost honey-coloured. She’s almost blinding.

“Are you okay?” he mumbles quietly as she puts her head on his shoulder.

“I think that’s what I should be asking you.”

“Well I asked you first.”

There are a few moments of silence after his words and then Hermione chuckles sadly.

“I’m tired. Ronald’s tiring.”

Harry bites his lower lip and throws his hand around Hermione.

“It’s because he seems to want to spend all his fucking time with me, and not like I’m complaining—“

“You’re complaining,” Harry grins.

“Fine, I _am_ complaining, but Harry, he’s not that majestic and smart and wonderful to tolerate him every single moment of my life!”

Harry laughs then, really laughs, chest shaking and crinkles by the eyes deepening; the dimples in his cheeks just as deep. He feels Hermione bursting into laughter too, the sound of it warming Harry up from the inside, her wild hair brushing his cheek and jaw.

“Maybe he gets tired of you time after time too?..”

“Yeah, and that’s exactly why I tell him to fuck off at like 9pm because _oh I have to go to bed,_ and then I sit in my dorm, locked up, studying or reading.”

“And then he comes at our dorm, looking like a kicked puppy...”

Hermione’s snort is absolutely and terrifyingly cruel.

“Come back to us, Harry,” she says quietly after a couple of minutes. “At least let’s study together, because I know you’re mirroring me in your bed every evening.”

Harry feels himself nodding once, heart clenched stupidly tight.

“I promise I’m not going to press you into talking about things you don’t want to. Just come back to us.”

Her words feel safe enough.

***

Harry could stare at the bubbles in his butterbeer for ages if Ginny wouldn’t shift uncomfortably for the fourth time beside him. He looks at her a little reluctantly, while the Halloween party Ravenclaws decided to throw out this year run its course. There’s nothing Halloween-ish in it, though, except for pumpkin treats on the table, no one’s wearing a costume. It’s just an other reason to get drunk, but in a slightly bigger company.

“Don’t you think we don’t talk enough?”

There’s a dare in the way she holds her chin and purses her lips, but her eyes aren’t squinted; the look in them is uncertain yet hopeful.

Harry starts feeling uncomfortable.

“And...is there anything you’d like to talk about?”

“I—Harry. We don’t talk _at all_.”

Harry stares at her blank-faced. She snorts bemusedly.

“I know you don’t really talk to anyone these days, but I’m not anyone. I hate to say it like that, but I’m your fucking girlfriend.”

With all due respect, it’s Harry’s turn to snort.

“Yeah, I agree. Sounds awful.”

Ginny lets a small smile touch the corners of her lips. Then she reaches out to Harry’s free hand and covers it with her small fingers.

“Why do you never show up at the gatherings any more?”

“I don’t want to play Truth or Dare.”

Ginny looks hurt, and Harry hates to admit it, but he doesn’t give a shit right now. She knows everything too bloody well, she’s not dumb, but so is Harry. And the last thing he wants to be this evening...or anytime, ever, is being fucking manipulated.

“It’s not always Truth or Dare.”

“Ginny...please,” the chuckle he lets out is savage and miserable at the same time.

“Fine. At least we’re talking right now. Who did you write that letter to?”

At least she finally said it.

“It’s not something I’d like to talk about.”

“Oh but I do! I have a right to know what’s up, I fucking care about you.”

“Well stop then.”

She looks absolutely and completely shocked. Harry hears Ron’s ‘The audacity!’ in his head and barely holds himself back from laughing.

“This person has nothing to do with me now. Don’t try to convince yourself it all started out with that dare.”

“And with what, then?”

“Uh, I don’t know, the war maybe? Don’t you think it kind of has to do something with the state we’re all in now?”

“Then why does everyone else seem to be alright?”

“Alright? So I’m not alright? I’m perfectly fine, Gin, I’m sorry if you think otherwise. If I’m not the same person I used to be, it doesn’t mean there’s something wrong with me.”

“So the person I fell for doesn’t exist anymore?”

Harry purses his lips and looks at her, trying to understand who’s wrong here. They’ve been apart for a year. A year of pain, a year of wandering, a year of utter hell. She’s not delusional, he might’ve not come back.

And why does it feel right to be the person he is now, then?

“I don’t know. You tell me.”

Why does it feel right to admit to his own damn self that he’s just used to the idea of Ginny? The idea of liking her, having her, thinking about her, letting her care about him? Not...not loving her. Not _right now_.

Harry shakes his head when she keeps looking at him with such familiar soft brown eyes, drowned in incredulity and pain. She’s right. They don’t talk enough. There’s simply nothing to talk about anymore.

When he stands up and catches Hermione’s gentle and empathetic look, Harry realizes there’s nothing wrong with his life. He wasn’t lying. He’s perfectly fine.

***

A sigh of relief escapes Harry’s lips when there’s a small brown and white owl waiting for him patiently on the windowsill of the dorm. It’s been almost two weeks since he’d sent the letter and an uncomfortable, nagging feeling has been tugging at his chest for a week. He quickly pulls out a small treat for her, some pork he happens to steal time after time just in case, and plomps on his bed, opening the envelope eagerly.

_Potter,_

_look who’s talking about being high up their ass._

_I chose watercolour drawing. And yes, I do know who Michelangelo is. I’m pretty sure both Muggle and Wizarding worlds ‘share it all’, at least because half of the most famous artists were wizards while the other one was not. My condolences on your loss of proper art education, but it’s never late to begin educating yourself. If you’re planning on visiting London, there’s an upcoming exhibition of Claude Monet in the Royal Academy of Arts, plus, you can always go to see permanent collections of the museums and galleries. Just don’t hesitate and join some group with a guide, analyzing artworks on your own is not the best thing to do without any proper knowledge. Ask Granger to join you and go see a ballet play. Or just a play. You’ve heard of Shakespeare, right?_

_Beauxbatons is situated in the mountains of the southern France. It’s rather warm here now, nothing like the British Isles. A lot of sun irritates my skin so I don’t go out often, but in November and December it’s promised to be much cooler. I can see the sea through my window. One of the greatest parts of where I am now. Some people might say it’s not that different to the view that The Great Lake gives us, but it is. It smells different, its colours are different. And it’s so much wider._

_Blaise joined the exchange program with Durmstrang a couple of years ago. He was the first one to lose his virginity out of us. Very notable indeed. There’s nothing else from his words that I remember._

_I bet you’d like it here (but still wax poetic on Hogwarts). Of course, not that much praise and recognition, our dearest Saviour, but still...French boys are much prettier than our English lads. As for the girls...honestly, same. Too bad you have your Weaslette and don’t want to see me ever again; I’d gladly invite you to come over sometime._

_Not like I’m wondering, but how do people there reacts towards Slytherins? I hope they’re not bullied, although I know it’s rather pathetic of me. Perhaps not bullied much?_

_They don’t really deserve it. Some of them never supported Voldemort in the first place, and some of them were forced into this by their family beliefs. I also happen to know a couple of people who chose the dark side just because they were expected to._

_However, I know they have to understand what they were into, but kids...a lot of them can be cruel and unforgiving. And successfully blind towards things they don’t wanna see. And it’s okay, nothing new here, and yet this problem would be essential in the lives of a lot of young Slytherin witches and wizards, for reasons I hope you do understand._

_Let me know your opinion on that matter._

_Best wishes,_

_D. Malfoy_

_P.S Hope you didn’t spend a lot of time overthinking the lack of response to your letter. I’ve been meaning to write one every single evening but couldn’t have gotten around because of the amount of homework. Even after a summer of private lessons it’s still a little bit hard to catch up on everything for I haven’t properly practiced French for years—_

and then his handwriting has a little different angle again, he's definitely stopped to think whether or not he should cross the sentence. Posh bloody idiot, of course he did not, of course everything has to be perfect in his letters. 

 _fuck_ , _didn’t mean to bother you with all that, just thought I owe you an explanation._

Harry’s front teeth are digging into his lower lip so deeply in attempt to control the widest grin it’s almost bleeding.

***

He’s been thinking about Slytherins, it’s true. The way first years were cringing when the Hat cried out ‘Slytherin’ on their heads, the silence after each time. Some of them looking almost embarrassed to wear their colours, some of them still walking with pride in their postures; but silent, every single one. Of course older students still get into fights with the other houses, but only when provoked. Otherwise...they prefer to remain unnoticed. Looking forward to finish the school and fuck off as soon as possible.

Harry writes it all down with a heavy heart, because Draco’s right. Slytherin doesn’t mean evil, he realizes it now, although he himself used to think otherwise a couple of years ago.

**I wish I could change their opinion but I really don’t know how. You’re right, kids are...kids can be cruel. Even I was, because the moment Ron told me that the darkest wizards and witches were Slytherins, I decided I had nothing to do with them because they’re bad. Evil. Merlin. I was so fucking stupid. But that’s what prejudice does.**

And some of the scars it leaves might be permanent, no matter how much time had passed.

**I don’t know how to switch the matter elegantly, because it’s a serious one, but, uh, so is art, right?**

**I mean, of course it is. Even I know that.**

**Thank you very much for your advice. I know who Shakespeare is, thank you very much (fuck, repeating sounds ugly but it’s like, said in a different manner, yeah?), although I have to admit I’m not that familiar with his works. I think Hermione has his book in her room, I’ll borrow it (if she lets me).**

**I haven’t spent a lot of time by the sea but I think it’s a completely different thing, in compare with a lake. And the french sun must be different, too, especially considering the air there. I wish I could look at the sea through my window, not like I’m complaining though, I like looking at the forest too, but. I don’t think it would be right to say I miss the sea, I’ve never properly been introduced to it, and yet the memories of it still have me fascinated.**

**And. One more thing.**

**Draco, I’ve told you already, I don’t hate you. Under Veritaserum, so you can’t not believe. It’s true, I thought I wouldn’t want to see you ever again, because it was really hard for me, loving you. I said I didn’t want to see you because I was afraid that it might come back. Now I don’t think meeting you would change anything. We’re talking, after all, it’s not different from verbal conversations. Well, not _that_ different.**

**I should’ve said ‘I hope I’ll never have to communicate with you again’ instead, but. You know. Kind of failed this one.**

**And please, don’t spend much time overthinking the things I’ve just said. Frowning doesn’t suit you.**

**Hope to hear from you soon(er than the last time),**

**Harry Potter**

**P.S Learning that Blaise has been the first one to get laid, for some reasons, didn’t surprise me at all.**

**P. P. S I won’t say I knew you’d choose watercolour drawing, my guess was on Quidditch, but it didn’t surprise me much, either.**

**P.P.P. S You’re not bothering me, I wouldn’t mind hearing about the difficulties of being transferred as well as about the enjoyable parts of it. Otherwise I’d be way too jealous.**


	4. no light, no light

Wide awake again, Harry’s lying in the bed and thinking, thinking, thinking. The sweat on his forehead has been cold for awhile, his heart is beating merely, almost solemnly in the depth of the night; and yet the cheeks under unblinking eyes are paler then the moonlight, and the sheets under the palms of his unmoving hands are way too crumbled.

He feels defeated.

Despite the triumph written on the faces of hundreds of people and in thousands of articles and books, it feels like a loss.

No, he feels like a loser. He doesn’t feel right.

So many deaths — so many crystal glass eyes, so many silver droplets of sweat on marble-carved cold foreheads, so many blood-covered mouths. These bodies could make constellations up in the sky, whole galaxies. But there would be no Harry between them, because Harry died, too, but came back. Just because he’s Harry Potter. Just because he’s the Chosen One. Not because it’s fair.

The weight of guilt when he looks at Teddy’s bright laughing eyes or sees George’s accidental smile under his bloodshot eyes. When the swoosh of Parvati Patil’s robes announce her lonely presence. The weight of guilt when Sirius is nothing but a shadow under Harry’s eyelids, and Alastor Moody pulls his chin up and presses his lips even tighter together to nod at him goodbye.

He felt Death in the core of his own existence. He met her and he knows what she smells like, what she sounds like and what noise she makes, arriving. And he felt Life a couple of times, he felt her the most when he was Voldemort himself, because this life was not real. It was teared apart, caged in metal, rage and bones, and the only thing that was real about her in his eyes was the light of green so bright Harry thought it would kill him as well.

Harry has no right to live, not after this. And yet he’s there, right there, in the Gryffindor tower, shivering under cold blankets and starry night.

He doesn’t even have anything to think about, to lull him back to sleep. Anything leads to devastation, and in the end he’s a shadow of his own self, half asleep — half awake, one eye opened to face the meaning of the night for there is a special one for Harry Potter now. At night, there’s no one but him. No one but him and his demons, curled up all over his body, whispering in his ears, breathing into his lips.

He wonders what Draco Malfoy feels at the moment, what he’s thinking about, what’s going on in his restless head.

***

When Ron emerges out of the bathroom the next morning and meets Harry’s eyes, his cheerful expression quickly melts into a slightly terrified one.

“Mate,” he breathes out, face still pink and fresh after the morning routine. “You look awful.”

Harry mimics a grin sardonically, wondering what’s worse: going back to bed and trying to sleep or staying awake till the evening.

“Is that because of Gin?” Ron asks carefully, and Harry frowns at that, confused.

“What about her?”

Ron’s gaze slips down in an awkward motion, and the sight of him is nothing but amusing, he’s like a deer caught in headlights.

“Didn’t you, eh, break up yesterday? I thought you were...mourning.”

Harry grimaces, not really able to control his expressions. Of all the thoughts he had last night, none of them was about Ginny, and that’s what he honestly informs Ron about.

“I didn’t even know we broke up,” Harry shrugs, and he realizes how exhausted he is because it’s actually an extremely uncomfortable situation and right now he feels nothing. He’s not in the right state of mind to react...anyhow. Otherwise he'd purse his lips apologetically, the theatrical genius he is. 

“She said you did,” Ron nods awkwardly.

“Well...not like I’m planning to mourn anyway.”

“Oh.”

Harry opens his mouth to explain, to try to explain, but he doesn’t find the words to do so. It just seems like there’s nothing to say, even Ron should realize it’s for the best, their breakup. At least he doesn’t seem mad. He’s the only person who could be.

“So the usual nightmares then?” Ron breathes out and elegantly (not really, but Harry’s still grateful) changes the subject of Harry’s love life.

“As if it’s not enough,” he says with a weak smile and moves towards the bathroom door, the familiar smell of Ron’s shampoo immediately brings him back to this world. In the mirror he’s looking too pale for Hermione’s liking, his hair’s a bit greasy, and no Quidditch practice will make those shoulders look less angular, make those clavicles look less like a haut-relief and more like a healthy human being’s.

It’s just a shitty day, it’s just a shitty morning. It’s probably just a shitty life but at least the mood swings don’t hit him in the face any more. He’s used to all the guilt, he’s used to feeling like a loser. A failure. In his own eyes, what’s more important. He’s used to knowing there’s nothing else he will ever be, because he’s Harry Potter. He’s eighteen years old and he’s been, he’s had, he’s tasted everything and anything he could not, let alone things he could. There would be no difference for him between dying tomorrow or forty years later. He held the world in his hands and they feel too unfamiliar now to hold his heart properly.

He blinks it all away and turns the shower on.

***

“You’re gonna catch a cold,” Ginny says to Harry when he enters the Common Room. His hair is still wet and he regrets coming down and not going back to bed after every single step he makes.

«You tell me this all the time,” Harry murmurs, wondering if it’s a hidden parallel or a metaphor and whether he’ll have to live through one more pointless conversation right now or not.

“Doesn’t mean you listen,” she smiles girlishly, freckled nose curving slowly. Harry starts to feel uncomfortable in his own skin again. This whole scene is...revolting. And there’s nothing he can do about the skin of his palms starting to itch violently.

Jesus Christ. He’s too dumb to play these deep ass games.

“‘s not worth saying then,” he says simply and continues moving towards the stairs, wanting nothing to do with anyone at the moment.

“Are you sure about us,” Ginny throws at his back in that typical challenging manner that he absolutely fucking hates about her because it really does work on him.

Because he turns to face her again.

“Do I look unsure to you?” Harry asks insinuatingly.

She presses her lips together tight, the tips of her ears and her cheeks reddening because of the failed attempt.

She takes a step in.

“If you think it’s for the best, you’re wrong. Im the only one who can save your from your misery, Harry, don’t fucking do that to yourself,” her eyes change into almost-pleading in a blink.

He looks at her looking at him with hope she knows she’s faking, and sees what she sees in him. Someone to cling onto, someone who knows what to do, someone who knows what she’s going through. A soldier, damaged by War. And that’s probably right, there’s no point to overdramatize the situation, but the problem is, it doesn’t feel right to not to. It feels like a double-masquerade. Harry knows too much, he knows what he has no right to know, and it’s heavier than his head that still sees Ginny as a person he loves, but with the same kind of love he’s used to. With the kind of love that doesn’t fit with him anymore, doesn’t fit with the change of his heart.

“Tell me what you want me to say, Gin,” he murmurs again, his eyes not leaving hers, and he almost sees the familiar resistance of green and red between them, how fucking ironic. So ironic he’s ready to break down and cry, but this time Ginny doesn’t say a word in return. She only stares at him, wide-eyed and petrified, lips pressed together tightly, teeth clenched, cheeks burning insanely hot. Harry shortly nods and leaves the Common Room, hoping that she has just finally understood.

 

***

It’s cold in the corridors when Harry walks towards the Great Hall, and even four sugars in his tea won’t help. Ginny’s nowhere to be seen and Seamus tells Hermione what happened between Harry and her in low whisper that is heard by every single person in radius of approximately three meters around them. In the end, Harry drinks his tea, hypnotizing the wall in front of him, then puts a piece of toast on his plate, ignores it and leaves under the questioning gazes of his housemates.

It’s still cold, the merciless grey sky holds clouds made of steel and copper, and when Harry enters his dorm to grab a sweater, there are two owls apparently bickering on the windowsill.

Carefully, Harry closes the door, but they stop trying to dig their beaks right into the neck of the one another's when he legit barks at them to do so. The smaller bird, warm grey with lost droplets of white feathers, quickly places itself on Harry’s shoulder and arrogantly ignores the other bird, puffing her chest out to let the boy untie the blue satin ribbon, holding a familiar light blue envelope. The other bird also slips its letter into Harry’s hands, and it’s also blue, but much darker shade, almost irritably vivid. The Ministry’s colour.

When both birds, well-fed and seemingly comforted, leave the room, Harry quickly opens the second envelope to make sure that it’s just an other letter from the Ministry’s Auror Department about their program that Harry’s already accepted to. And Ron. And Cho.

Harry catches himself cringing and immediately feels bad about it. He has so many advantages, he should feel so grateful, he should be all but stunned with the thought of spending his life as an Auror. But at the same time there’s this growing and nagging reminder that all that is just because he did what he had to do, he fought who he had to fight, he is the Golden Boy. And now he’s expected to lead a happy life of a magic policeman just because fifteen year old him thought it’d be cool.

Now he knows it’s really not.

Harry bites his lower lip in order to escape the familiar feeling of despair when he’s trying to figure out what to do with his future and takes the second letter in his hands. The nagging feeling of anxiety slowly dissolves in the wave of bubbling anticipation.

  _Potter,_  
  
_I didn’t choose Quidditch because practices and keeping in shape take a lot of effort and time that I don’t have now. And watercolour drawing has this soothing effect on me that I appreciate a whole lot._  
  
_Yes, you’re right, Potter, our verbal conversations used to be just like that._  
   
The last three words are somehow written in even more cursive than the rest, and that's supposed to be fucking impossible.

 _I really missed talking to you about art, the sea and hobbies. So glad the distance is not a problem for us._  
   
Harry shakes his head, rolls his eyes and grins, biting his lower lip. He stops reading for a couple of seconds, because the realization only hits him now. They’re really talking. They’re exploring each other with every letter, little by little, after all that they’ve been through, after all this time. It doesn’t feel absurdly, nor it feels like drinking a cold cup of tea.

His mind starts wandering a bit further, to the future. In the end, they won’t ever be real friends, they eventually will stop writing each other, they will probably really never meet...and it hurts more that Harry would like to admit.  
   
Finally. One reason to stop writing letters to Draco Malfoy.  
   
Is it good enough to consider? Of course not.  
   
_I got a letter from Mr Diler and he said he liked you a lot. He also said he was pleasantly surprised after you told him your name and that he was glad that now I have such a darling for a friend._  
   
Darling. Okay. If Harry’s heart misses several beats it doesn’t matter.

_Must be the hair. His is as bad as yours, and yet it looks ten times better because of the whites here and there. If you manage to survive the next few years, maybe your nest will have a chance to look half as good._

Despite the insults, Harry smiles to himself and tries to imagine what Draco looks like now. If his hair is longer, if his body is healthier, if his eyes are no more glass-made. If the soft kisses of rose petals are back and blooming on his cheeks. He wouldn’t dare to ask.  
   
_And to be honest, I don’t know what to tell you on the Slytherin matter. I would like to say a lot of things but I’m not in a right position at all. Just don’t forget that you’re a role model, Potter, whether you like it or not. And people like to remember but tend to forget. Sometimes time is the best and only thing we can afford._

 _I believe the skating season starts soon. I wonder if they let the pond in the schoolyard freeze. I hope so, because the scenery would be breathtaking. Just imagine: skating among students in light sky-blue robes and nothing but lavender-grey mountains and white forests behind. And no back thoughts about the Giant Squid breaking the ice and gagging you._  
  
_Hope you’re jealous enough._  
  
_Sincerely,_  
  
_D. Malfoy_

   
“How do those Ministry birds even work? They never deliver with the other owls,” Ron waltzes into the room, yawning and stretching lazily. Harry’s never told Ron the owls were not, in fact, always from the Ministry, simply because then it would be too obvious who they are from. Plus, when at the end of August Harry blurted out that he wouldn’t really want to spend his life fighting, no matter what it’s called at the Ministry, Ron went nuts and began waxing poetic on the perks of being an Auror. He thinks he’s succeeded every time Harry opens a light-blue envelope. Harry knows better.

Harry looks through the window at the Great Lake, indifferently blue and cold under the clear frosty sky. Soon its shores will be wrapped in ice too, and Harry already knows that each skating session’s gonna be bittersweet, all because of one grey-eyed wonder.

He remembers seing Draco on ice. It probably was a catalyst for his poor little heart back in the Third Year, when for every student it was the beginning of something new. First two years were all about Harry caring unexplainably much for Malfoy and getting way too angry about this because he _hated_ the git, and then...then the summer passed, and Malfoy stopped using so much hail product and his platinum-blond hair started glowing both softer and brighter in the sun; his baby cheeks were replaced with tentatively carved cheekbones, thus slightly chapped thin lips turned plumper and more elegantly arched; even his fucking voice got upgraded, from childishly squeaky to deep and cool, like satin, sending cool shivers down Harry’s constantly sexually frustrated body. And when Harry saw this tall and lean arrogant problem skating like a god, with screaming pink cheeks, and iridescent fucking smile, laughing like Harry had never seen before, like he could never even imagine someone like Malfoy could...

Harry lets go of breath he didn’t know he was holding.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so yeah these days it's all about my libra moon ass


	5. i was disappearing in plain sight

**Dear Draco,**

**oh alright then, I’ll very much try my best to not to die before my hair turns grey. Noting the fact that I already have a lot of whites, it won’t take me that long. Hope I won’t be balding any time soon, it would be such a shame.**

Remembering Lucius’ or Narcissa’s long thick hair, Draco shouldn’t too. In fact, remembering Lucius and Narcissa all together promises that Time will do him good, extremely good, in fact, because both of his parents are gorgeous, are now just as they were ten years ago, when Harry met them for the first time. Lucius’ pale skin, his grey eyes, angular face with pointy chin and frozen cheekbones, cutting into jawline. His long strong body, legs for days, wide shoulders; Narcissa’s gorgeously serene posture, her narrow waist, her elegant hands and her cool voice. Millions of wrinkles in the corners of her eyes that have the same heavy lids that Draco has, deep lines across the high forehead suggest that nothing will ruin the marble-carved beauty of this face.

Harry knows thinking this way of this particular family is...not correct. Not right. But, so what if Lucius is hiding Merlin knows where and Narcissa is under the closest of control somewhere in France; Harry has never cared about such things, they just don’t seem important enough, in the end, he, the Boy Who Lived, used to be in love with a Death Eater’s son once. We don’t get to choose our hearts, to choose what or who we want. And as wrong as it sounds, there’s nothing more right about this.

Harry can tell the difference between wrong and right, due to the series of unfortunate events in his life. And by now he’s learned to count on his inner senses, premonitions, if you let him. He doesn’t feel wrong about this whole letter exchange with Draco. And he did, about a lot of things recently: Ginny, the Auror program, at the least. At this point in his life, he really doesn’t know what to do, he’s not scared — he’s fucking terrified, and if there is something he’s sure of, something familiar, well then. That’s something he’ll sure be clinging onto.

And at the same time, turns out Draco Malfoy is a complete mystery for him, Harry Potter, and this feeling of interest, of an abstract attraction now that he knows he’s given an opportunity to explore, almost breathes something in him. He’s not as apathetic as he was a couple of months ago, and so what if it’s a Death Eater’s son that gives him all that these days? So what?

This could be an endless monologue, a dialogue rather, between him and himself, but Harry’s too tired. He has a tendency to overanalyze and sometimes it...it shows.

Harry thinks once again about Lucius Malfoy’s hard wrathful gaze, his lips white, pressed against each other; and Narcissa’s dry but warm fingers right above his heart, her whisper — she was barely breathing, too petrified and shaken yet still driven by her neverending love, and dips the tip of his quill into ink once again.

***

“I have never enjoyed being on ice,” Mister Diler says, putting the kettle on the table. Harry instinctively moves his red frozen fingers closer towards it, the rest of his body has almost done melting by now. He watches the man completing his tea ritual, and although kitchen magic schemes where everyone and everything is moved with pure magic still amaze Harry, there’s something endlessly lovely in Mister Diler’s completely magicless tea and dessert performing ceremonies. There’s probably nothing performance-y in this, the man’s just used to this just like Harry’s used to taking a shower in the morning instead of applying cleaning charms, but it’s still...lovely. This exact word. Pour the steaming hot water from one kettle to another, smaller one, add two spoonfuls of tea, close the cap, put the small kettle on the bigger one, turn around, take the hourglass-shaped turkish tea-glasses with little silver saucers, put one of them in front of Harry, the other one in front of the empty chair, cut a large honeycomb into pieces, add some white turkish thing that looks like whipped cream but tastes like whipped butter with sugar and cream cheese. Sit down. Exhale. Light up a cigarette. Open the small kettle and stir the tea with a teaspoon. Close it again. “The climate in Istanbul is not exactly encouraging for skating rinks, and even when I was visiting my sister, she lives in Anatolian mountains, in Kayseri, and her children made me go skating with them, I don’t think I had ever felt as foolish and insecure as I did that day, Harry.”

Harry chuckles and shrugs.

“I guess it’s because you grew up not being used to this. Like, in hot countries they roller-skate, right?”

“Well, a lot of others do, but not me. I don’t think it’s because of my habitats, canım, but because I’m lazier than a troll,” he explains casually, and Harry laughs at that, not taking his eyes off of the tea, quickly filling up his teaglass. “Thank you.”

“Aafiyet olsun, of course,” he says and takes a seat as well. He has the smallest, probably turkish, teaspoons Harry’s ever seen, and in his long thick fingers they look especially, almost ridiculously tiny.

“Oh my god,” Harry breaths out surprisedly when Mr Diler adds the third spoonful of sugar. Even considering the size of these spoons, it’s still a lot — the glasses are not exactly huge either, about four or five medium-sized sips. “Such tea? With this?” he points at the honeycomb sweet. “Unimaginable.”

The man lets out a laugh and shrugs.

“Your friend Draco has a sweeter tooth than me,” he says, and Harry catches himself freezing at the sound of this name and then staring at Mr Diler wide-eyed, ready to swallow every bit of information. “Although he likes his tea strong, with milk and no sugar, his coffee tastes like a coffee-scented candy,” he cuts his honeycomb into two and chuckles. Harry doesn’t even try to hide his smile. “And the tea, oh he drinks his tea first, till the last droplet, and then begins with his dessert. I used to think he only drinks tea to make an excuse for all the sugar he consumes on a daily basis, but it didn’t take me long to find out that he doesn’t need tea to have a huge slice of cake in the middle of the day just because.”

Harry feels something long forgotten rising up in his chest again. Something he wants to wear like a trophy, something he wants to have his name on it, something that reminds him the feeling when the Order kids kept managing their Patronuses one by one or when Ron and Hermione were given the role of Prefects; but still not really. For the first time maybe in his life, someone says something normal about Draco, without hate or disapproval. Something not nice and not bad either. And it feels amazing, to be able to smile for him, to smile and not weird out, to feel this...this _fondness_ of him. Fondness. This word tastes better than a honeycomb. Better than a honeycomb with kaymak and tea.

Harry blinks and looks down, unsuccessfully trying to hide the expressions he’s wearing.

***

“It’s still unhealthy,” Hermione’s look when Ron takes a slice of spinach pie instead another sausage (or three) is sharper than a paperknife.

“But I’m hungry!” he objects, and Harry accidentally catches Hermione’s eyes when she shakes her head irritatedly, which was definitely not a good idea.

“And you, Harry, you only ate a piece of toast!”

“At least he ate,” Ron snorts, and Harry rolls his eyes.

“Yeah, thank you very much for your concern, but I don’t think I’ll eat more if you keep doing that. I could, like, have a breakdown or something, or, I don’t know, as a protest I could eat nothing at all.”

The cheerful screech of the owls breaks the tensed silence between the three of them, and, as always, Harry’s stupid illogical hope brings back the colour in his cheeks.

“Hello hello hello, ol’ pal,” Ron breathes out in an awe when a big brown owl solemnly swoops down beside them. Harry’s not sure if it’s Bill’s owl or Charlie’s, but either is good. The bird moves towards his plate and looks contemptuously at the crumbs. Harry huffs out a small smile and puts there a new piece of toast with bacon and begins to slice it.

“Fuck,” Ron snorts again and Harry turns his head towards him a little, continuing doing his thing. “Bill says mom’s furious that you broke up and says it’s not a good idea for you to spend all the Christmas holidays at the Burrow, although mom still loves you more than some of her own children. It’s more for the sake of Gin, you know,” and Harry nods at it, because he’s thought about it before. This year, he wouldn’t stay there after Christmas even for Mrs Weasley’s treacle tart every day.

“Fucking bullshit,” Hermione breathes quietly under her nose, and Harry bites down a smile. “She’s an adult, not some thirteen years old child.”

“Well as long as everyone keeps treating her as one,” Ron answers almost politely, and it’s so—in a brotherish way it doesn’t sound wrong. “Oh shit, Bill says they’re going to visit Fleur’s parents the day after Christmas and invites us to go with them. They’re gonna spend two weeks or so in Paris. Not like I think there would be...”

But for Harry, the world suddenly goes blank and mute. The echo of Ron’s voice is long forgotten and instead there’s this huge something that sounds familiar, too familiar, as if he’d been thinking about this for ages deep in his head, somewhere at the very borders of his sanity, waiting either too patiently or extremely impatiently for someone else to ring this particular bell, but at the same time there is an excitement too grand and loud to be considered before. In his chest, Harry’s poor chest, every single bone starts waltzing around in a diabolical rhythm, and his heart feels as if it has just grown up to the size of a Black Hole. Of course in real life he’s just a pathetic moron who keeps gaping stupidly at the space between Ron’s and Hermione’s heads, but on the inside he’s burning like a nuclear reactor. It’s unfair that the thought of meeting one single person who probably wants to do nothing with you makes a man like that.

“Fuck!” he jumps a little only when the owl bites his finger suddenly. In our realm, its huge eyes look into him expectantly and a little skeptically, and Harry can do nothing but roll his eyes a little.

“Here,” he says, putting the plate in front of the bird. “Enjoy yourself.”

Ron snorts, and Harry looks up, remembering what has just happened.

“Is that an invitation for the three of us?” he asks lamely, and the moment he catches Hermione’s gaze, he knows it’s over for him.

She knows everything. It’s fucking terrifying. Especially when she looks at him like that, like that goddamn owl, with her brows raised slightly, the corners of her lips deeper than they usually are in an almost-mocking half-smirk, her eyes shining mischievously. Hermione Granger is fucking terrifying.

But god he’s happy that doesn’t look disappointed or mad or anything negative. Even after Draco’s attitude towards her. She’s one of the most understanding people of all, although at the same time she’s almost unbreakable in her beliefs, and...yes. Hermione Granger is also a gem.

“Yeah, sure,” Ron says, still unconscious of everyone and everything happening around him. “I think it would be cool. They want to travel by train, by the way, like Muggles, from London. I love trains...”

Harry smiles at this, but he’s watching Hermione watching him. She answers him with a slight shrug, as they continue this little wordless dialogue, and Harry feels thirteen again.

***

Snow always reminds Harry of Hedwig. Especially in the morning, when the last thing you saw through the window was the dull dirty browns and greys of the ground, and then this clean infinite sheet of white leaves you blinded, standing in front of your brief reflection, gaping at your own wide eyes.

It’s not such a morning, the snow has been covering miles and miles of hills and forests around Hogwarts, but Harry’s too used to this feeling to feel anything else, staring at the snow after waking up. With Hedwig comes Fred, with Fred comes Snape, Sirius follows right after, and it all starts again. This cool apathy, this feeling of guilt, of shame, of irrationalism. And to escape it all, to block the melancholy, maybe he shouldn’t stay on his own, maybe he should come down the stairs to the Common Room, to Breakfast, anywhere. But it’s a lonely Sunday, and although he knows he’s wrong, especially although he _knows_ he’s been better lately, he pushes his head back to this swamp, putting on his warm clothes and leaving the castle, almost as if he’s consciously punishing himself, almost as if he’s enjoying this act of pure and loud masochism.

It’s not cold at all outsides, and the snow keeps pirouetting down in big soft flakes. Harry’s step is quick in compare with their lazy movements, and soon the boy feels his heart beating so fast that the air burns his throat, he’s drinking it too frequently. He slows down and notices that he’s in the middle of the forest. He hears nothing but the sounds his breath and his steps, the snow so soft it doesn’t even creak.

Harry leans down and grabs a handful of it, then keeps walking. It melts in a minute, leaving the palm of his hand wet. He keeps walking. He realizes he’s trying to hide, to disappear in this white emptiness. He’s trying to runaway. He’s a coward. He doesn’t want to remember. He has blood  
on his arms that will never wash out, and the only option is cutting them away.

Hedwig’s feathers were just like these snowflakes, just like them. Softer, much softer, but just as white, clean, gracious in their glory. Beautiful.

He thinks he must be dreaming when he hears the familiar sound of a birds swooping down. He thinks he’s gone mental when he feels a small weight on his shoulder.

He knows he’s absolutely fine when a beautiful grey owl blinks at him with her big wise eyes and fidgets a little, trying to point him at her own weight. Of course it’s a blue envelope. Of course it’s _him_ who brings him back to reality. Of course it’s _him_ who reminds him of the moment, of _the now-now_. Of life he has to lead, of life he is capable of leading even with hands covered in blood and stone-cold faces, imprinted on the inside of his eyeballs.

Harry realizes there’s a tear sliding down his cheek slowly only when the wind blows right into his face and bites the wet path it leaves. The bird howls benignly and fidgets again.

“Let’s take you to Hagrid, love,” Harry whispers and pats her head with the knuckle of his index finger. “It’s a shorter walk.”


	6. in your bright blue eyes

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> guys thank you so much for all your likes and comments, i couldn’t be more grateful for such readers. i love and appreciate every single one of you, hope you like where the story goes

“Such a gorgeous bird you’ve got, ‘arry,” Hagrid purrs under his nose, stroking her beautiful grey feathers with his giant fingers as she eats.

 

“She’s not mine,” Harry admits, meeting her amber eyes and crooking the corners of his lips slightly. “But she is gorgeous.”

 

“I hope the message she just delivered will be as lovely.”

 

Unfortunately, Harry can’t help but drop his smile. He’s been thinking for days, those long couple of days, thinking of the way to ask Draco about his winter break plans, about the possibility of their meeting in Paris (or wherever in France, really), but every line sounds lame, maybe the whole situation is lame, maybe Draco would want to do absolutely nothing with him in real life, maybe this would break even this little private thing they’re having—

 

“ ‘arry? You aite?”

 

Harry shrugs. His shoes look exceptionally interesting in the dim light of Hagrid’s living room.

 

“I just,” telling Hagrid about Draco, _everything_ about Draco, maybe wouldn’t be a good idea. At least not now. Who knows, maybe it won’t go anywhere at all and wasting time on discussing this all would be...rather pointless. And at the same time, who Harry thinks he is to lie to Hagrid’s face? “I don’t know what to do.”

 

A small silence follows after his words, as Hagrid purses his lips thoughtfully under his curly brown beard and refills their tea cups. Harry watches him attentively, fearing that he’s waiting for an explanation.

 

Thankfully, he’s not.

 

“Everyone at some point comes to this thought at the last year of school,” Hagrid says after a deep breath.

 

Harry looks at him surprisedly for a moment, but then it all clicks and suddenly there’s the hot wave of gratitude rising up in his chest. Hagrid, lovely Hagrid and his gigantic hands and even bigger heart, his iridescent smile, lost under thick curls of his beard, mesmerizing eyes of the kindest, warmest brown.

 

He looks at Harry’s childish smile and hot blush stains his cheeks in bright red.

 

“It’s not what ye were talking about, rite?”

 

Harry chuckles, but his smile still saddens a little.

 

“Unfortunately, it is,” he nods. It’s still a problem, maybe not as big as Draco Malfoy (what up, it’s Harry, he’s eighteen and he’s never fucking learned how to set his priorities right), and yet it’s something he’s unsuccessfully trying to not to think about at the rare moments of comfort, for it’s a matter of his future life. And unfortunately now he likes the perspective of getting pissed at Grimmauld Place every day and overdosing on treacle tart (or meth) much more than fighting dark wizards for the rest of his life.

 

Hagrid sighs again.

 

“Ye know, I’ve never understood yeh desire to apply for the Auror Training Program,” he says then, quietly, looking in the window. “It’s weird, for someone who’s gone through so many fights, to want to fight for his entire life.”

 

And again, Harry stares at him in shock.

 

“Hagrid,” he says, voice breaking, “I’ve been thinking exactly the same. I don’t want this. I hate the idea of it and...”

 

“Then why do ye say ye don know whatta do?”

 

It sounds so simple. It is simple, but sometimes all we need is to be put right in front of this simplicity to see it and to make sure that _that is that_. 

 

“I don’t know what else to do,” the boy shrugs, but on the inside, he feels completely different. He has never, ever said this out loud, but somehow it made him feel a hundred times lighter.

 

“It’s a completely different story, ‘arry,” Hagrid breathes out with a hint of a smile in his low yet tender voice. “It doesn’t mean ye should do what ye don want to do just because you haven’t found the right path to follow.”

 

No one knows it, but Hagrid’s secretly one of the wisest people Harry’s ever met. He doesn’t really know what to say, to thank him or to break down and start rambling, but the man speaks first, by now with a full-up grin.

 

“I forgot I have to feed the slugs,” he says, standing up. “Ye can wait for me here, if yev got nothin’ to do.”

 

When Harry nods and decides on thanking him, Hagrid only shakes his head and strokes the owl’s feathers once again.

 

“I just hope the letter is not about that. In any case, there are ink and parchment on the second shelf.”

 

***

 

_Potter,_

_I would suggest dyeing your hair, but I’m afraid any dye damages hair structure, and yours already looks as if you’ve been shagged during a tornado; so no, I wouldn’t recommend it. People will love you even if you’re bald, don’t worry._

 

Prick.

 

_I learned that the pond in Beauxbatons gardens is one of the deepest ponds in Europe and is a home to a small colony of mermaids. At one of the lessons we had towork on our communication skills and kind of interview one of them, and it turned out they’re much prettier than the ones in the Great Lake. And not as angry. And their kiss does really make a man immune to drowning — it does really give an ability to breathe underwater. I’m not quite sure why I’m telling you all this, but during the lesson I thought of you and the damned Tournament at the Fourth Year, so enjoy this new information. I would even try to win a kiss from one of them, too bad I know they once ate a student about fourty years ago, when she was trying to get kissed. On the other hand, what a wonderful way to die. Very romantic. If I ever finally decide to end the fuckery that is my life, this strategy would be the first on my list._

 

Harry doesn’t know how to react. If he should be worried or happy, whether it’s a deep physiological trauma he’s being introduced to or an odd, kind of darkish sense of humour. Still, rereading the _“I thought of you”_ part has already made Harry’s stomach twist in the most pleasant way. It’s good to know that you slide into the thoughts of the man who occupies all yours. Still, it’s not like Harry’s in love. He’s done falling. He thinks. He would know. There’s no way he wouldn’t. If there’s something in this life he does know for sure, it’s the feeling of being head over heels for a Death Eater’s son.

_By the way. Winter break starts soon and_

 

Harry’s heart starts beating faster.

 

_I’m going to stay at my friend’s in Vienna. Are you going somewhere? I’m asking to make up a plan for our correspondence , I wouldn’t want to lose any of your letters and I also doubt that you won’t overreact in case my letter gets lost. In the end, there’s International Mail Delivery Service, but I won’t feel so free writing to you, since my name is not that unfamiliar. Even in compare with yours, Boy Wonder. I’m not even sure they don’t have all our previous letters checked out, but we haven’t gotten The Witch Weekly’s cover yet, so maybe there is hope._

_I’ve been waking up to heavy snowstorms, heavier than I’ve ever seen. One morning I went flying for the first time since forever, and it was an Experience. I felt invisible, I felt like nobody in the chaos of nature. It gave me the feeling I’ve never felt before, I was small and I was nothing in compare with the clouds, the sky, the roaring wind, and it felt oddly addictive. Usually I’m everything, and then I was nothing at all. It felt satisfying, for reasons I don’t understand. I didn’t feel that in England, when no one would look at me without sneering, I didn’t feel it when The Dark Lord and the others didn’t even notice me in the room. I didn’t feel it after the War, when every single student avoided me like plague._

_People I’ve befriended here either say I think too much or try to search for a deeper meaning behind my words, and I hope...I know you’re not like them. I know you’ll listen just for the sake of listening, Potter. It’s always like that with people who have their own stories to tell._

_Hoping he’s not a boring narrator,_

_D. Malfoy_

 

 

Why does everything about Draco Malfoy has to be so bloody complicated, for fuck’s sake. He should be disappointed, he should be hurt, he should be a little bit mad, as well. He’s already bought a ticket to France, for god’s sake.

 

But he’s not any of those things. Later, maybe. Walking in the streets of Paris, he definitely will be. But right now, he’s rereading the other words. The _“make up a plan for_ our _correspondence”_ ones, the _“wouldn’t want to lose any of your letters”_. The last two paragraphs, too. If he used to doubt his place in Draco’s life, everything is crystal clear now.

 

Today is an important day. Okay, he won’t be seeing him any time soon, maybe that time at the Platform half a year ago was the last time Harry Potter saw Draco Malfoy, but _he cares for him_. For his letters, for his thoughts, for _him_. He trusts Harry. He opens up, brick by brick, little by little. And what Harry gets is so much better than anything, anything else he can think of.

 

Later in the evening, he walks into the Great Hall and his body does really feel lighter. He shoots a grin at Luna, who waves at him with a blinding smile, and for the first time in months he sits down to eat, not to torture himself. Treacle tart looks especially sexy today under golden lights, and in the morning, Harry beams at the sight of banana waffles, sleek with maple syrup.

 

“What’s wrong with him,” he hears Seamus ask when he pours himself a second glass of milk.

 

“Shh,” Ron answers, not looking up from his copy of The Prophet. “We’re trying to act natural so he doesn’t get spooked.”

 

Hermione purses her lips, closes her eyes, defeatedly and buries her face in the palm of her hand.

 

“Fucking degenerate,” Seamus concludes deadpan, and everyone hears Hermione chuckling at this.

 

***

 

**Dear Draco,**

****

**I know what you were talking about in your last letter. I felt it for the first time with Professor Lupin, back in the third year. We were standing on the bridge and I was really kind of heartbroken about...well, everything, and while he talked I could only stare at the sky: it was one of the blissful moments of the golden hour, and then the Great Lake wore a perfect reflection of the shimmering clouds, too, there was an Armade of clouds up there, and I realized I didn’t matter at all. Even with all things I went through, heartbroken or not, happy or upset, the sky would go on and on, and the water would answer it wordlessly, and the wind would blow away every single thought of mine. No one matters in the face of those silent greatness, and I apologize if I’m not eloquent enough, or if I’m rambling, but it was a big moment for me, too. I had to realize I was not the most important thing on the Earth, and that all the things seemed ridiculous in compare with them — the sky, the lake, the wind and the clouds above my head. You’re right — it’s oddly satisfying, as satisfying as it is comforting.**

**But I’m glad it’s not a permanent feeling, you know. I think it comes and goes at the right time. I think laughing would be harder, knowing there’s no pointing in your laugh, and so would be crying. Sometimes we’re on top of the Earth and sometimes we have to remember the Earth won’t even notice when we’re gone.**

 

Harry lets a couple of moments pass, lower lip between his teeth.

 

**There are big snow storms coming, they say, I think the same winds that you flew in. The owls may be in danger and I hope I’ll have the chance to have this letter delivered to you before they close the Owlery for this unexpected break. I think it would be right to wish you a Happy Christmas now, as there may not be another chance to do it before December 25, but I don’t even have a card to send to you.**

 

Harry wants to punch himself in the face for writing this. He also knows he will probably regret writing the next paragraph, but something in his chest screams for a revelation. He obliges.

 

**Funnily enough, right before receiving your last letter, we’d decided on going to France for our break. If we’re being completely honest with each other, I’ve been torturing myself for days before learning that you’ll be in Vienna — I simply didn’t know how to tell you. I didn’t even know if I had to tell you, in the first place, since we decided on not wanting to see each other ever again, and**

he sighs.

 

**I’m glad it all got sorted out. I think it’s for the best, really. I’ve never learned how to talk to you in real life. With letters, I have enough time to think.**

Harry has never been on such level of intimacy with anyone, ever. It’s like he voluntarily cuts his chest open, pushes his own fingers through his flesh and his ribs apart. It’s more than being naked, it’s more than letting in.

**I hope you’ll have a great time traveling to Vienna. I don’t think I’m gonna hear from you soon, so Merry Christmas to you, and a happy New Year. A happier one, for certain.**

**With this and all the loveliest things to wish,**

**Harry**

Later, two hours after sending the owl, Harry learns that most of the owls stopped somewhere in the middle of their way, because the storm is to hit this night.

 

***

 

It’s true, he doesn’t hear from Draco, and after a rather tensed yet warm dinner at the Burrow Harry excuses himself and Apparites to The Grimmauld Place. Two days later, he packs his suitcase and catches a cab to the train station to meet Bill, Fleur, Ron and Hermione.

 

“Call me sensitive,” Bill chuckles when they find their seats in the train, “but I think I’ll always be excited for the train rides because of Hogwarts.”

 

The conversation flows easily between the five of them, and Harry is honest to god happy. He watches fields and mountains, deep blue waters and cold abandoned shores, listens to the familiar clatter of the rails under their train. They buy hot chocolate a sweet French lady offers them and profiteroles, and Harry tells everyone about Mr Diler. They listen enthusiastically about Turkish sweets, and Fleur says that she loves Turkish cuisine even more than French. She talks to Hermione in French, as Hermione knows a couple of most necessary phrases, and then Bill suddenly impresses them all with his knowledge of the language.

 

“Don’t tell me you can speak it too, mate,” Ron whispers in Harry’s ear, and they shake hands miserably after Harry pointedly purses his lips.

 

They step on the platform in Paris, and Harry feels just the least bit of heartbroken. He’s still excited, anticipating those upcoming days in a completely new city, and when the rest of his group leaves to find the restrooms, the thought of being the only single one in this trip doesn’t even upset him. Everything goes like it should be going.

 

The station is busy, like any station. He hears French, English, Italian, Chinese, even Turkish through the crowd, and it smells like oily chocolate doughnuts a curly boy sells at the beginning of the platform, cigarette smoke and winter dirt. Everything moves around Harry, and he feels like he’s the only thing steady. He puts his hands in the pockets of his coat and tries to find a window, but there are only sets of stained glass just below the high ceiling. The sky is already black and of course no star is visible in this kind of toxic darkness of a big city.

 

His friends are late, and it’s probably because the restrooms in such places are always crowded as fuck. The robotic voice announces another departure, and Harry doesn’t pay attention to the words but looks at the vehicle nevertheless, it’s right in front of him.

 

A family of three, with a little girl in between, with her hands squeezed in her parents’ hands, laughs as they run towards the enter. Couples either say their goodbyes and i-promise-yous or walk in together, smiling. Always-busy workers march into the doors with their long hurried steps.

 

Harry looks at the windows. In the first one, there is a company of women arguing. The second one is empty. In the third window, there is a boy of four or five looking back at Harry, with his little palms and his small nose pressed against the glass. Harry chuckles, then smiles at the boy. There is a silhouette in the second window, someone just walked in. The boy looks at Harry judgingly first, then smiles back, showing his one front tooth proudly. Harry chuckles softly again, then he waves. He doesn’t know if it’s a hello or a goodbye. In return, he gets a grimace with a little pink tongue out. Harry gasps silently, lips breaking apart, and theatrically hits his chest with the palm of his hand. The boy laughs and when Harry imagines the sound of his laugher, he can’t help but grin again. With the corner of his eye, he sees a man sitting next to the window number two. Boring. But the kid disappears soon, and Harry looks at the window number four.

 

Then his heart misses a beat.

 

In the window number two, a man slides his hand through the soft-looking silvery-blond hair that fall back on his forehead in thick wavy locks. His gaze is unfocused, he looks at the empty seat in front of him blindly, and his nostrils copy the calm and heavy rhythm of his chest. Harry can only see the man’s profile, but his pale cheeks wear a soft kiss of blush on their pointed edges, his jawline is to die for, and his white neck disappears under the grey collar of his shirt. His elbow rests on the windowsill, and his long pale fingers are frozen in a pinching motion. 

 

Harry looks at Draco as if he sees him for the first time. He doesn’t feel like fainting, he doesn’t feel sick. He’s almost sure his heart’s beating alright. He breaths softly, almost tenderly, and he can’t believe that he’s not dreaming, he doesn’t want it to end. Harry realizes he missed just _looking_ at him, swallowing up Draco’s features, his movements, the emotions written on the face of his.

 

The train flinches and Draco’s shoulders tremble too. With a blink of his eyes, he comes back to reality. He looks down, then back, then moves his head a little to look through the window, and— _yes_.

 

He looks at Harry. Harry watches the shadow of recognition passing the lovely grey eyes of his, and then his scarlet lips fall apart. He must be breathing out heavily, because there is a sweaty spot forming on the window glass. The blond needs two or three seconds to collect himself, then he looks to the back, he looks at the watch on his wrist, he tries to stand up, but Harry already knows it’s not going to happen. The wheels of his train slowly start moving. Draco feels it too, and looks at Harry again, his cheeks visibly redder. His irises are darker and the spark in them shines brighter. Harry feels the corners of his lips curling up. Draco shakes his head slowly, the look in his eyes is a storm of emotions — shock, anger, irritation, resistance, but they’re screaming at Harry, and he knows for sure what they’re trying to say. He understands them.

 

As the train gains its speed, Harry’s heart does too. He watches Draco watching him, and his chest blooms in the most beautiful, most desperate, most tender way. And when the train’s long gone and Harry hears Hermione’s voice through the rush of blood in his ears, he’s fine. He’s finer than he’s been in months.

 

“Harry? Are you okay?”

 

“You look like you’ve just seen a ghost,” Bill says worriedly, and Harry shakes his head.

 

“Just tired,” he answers, and meets Hermione’s eyes.

 

“Let’z get oüt of he’e,” Fleur commands, and they all turn towards the exit.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> oh so yall wanted them to meet eh? (:


	7. you are the morning when it’s clear

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so i decided that i hate the update i posted yesterday so i’m sorry for having you guys confused. hope you’ll like the new chapter and if there’s anyone who managed to catch yesterday’s update — well i hope you’ll like this one better

 

Paris is not that different to London, especially in the middle of winter, but it’s still something else. The natural flow of the city is less uptight, less _prudish_ , kind of. No one seems to stick to any roles, people are more careless; or maybe it’s just Harry. Paris is also dirty, dirtier than London, although London’s not exactly clean either.

 

When they’re not occupied with sightseeing, Harry goes for long walks. He had no idea he’d love just _walking_ in the streets so much. Soon, he stops comparing everything with London, and the tension in his shoulders slowly melts away.

 

He gets lost and then finds himself moving in already familiar routes. He terrorizes local patisseries and makes mental notes to always try out something new. He doesn’t get recognized in Wizarding Paris, not even once. He tries and fails miserably at speaking French.

 

And most of all, Harry thinks of Draco.

 

He looked healthier. His cheeks were fuller, his skin was still pale, yet no more pallid, resembling wax — but a soft, expensive ivory. His movements never lost their grace, but the swift strangled motions of the last two years were replaced with his former elegance. The look in his beautiful grey eyes was a mixture of something Harry was used to from their very first meeting — it was sophisticated and poised, but the heated boyish snootiness of his childhood and then the doomed broken devastation of times the War gave in to be replaced with one of a kind determined, self-sufficient, a little bit defiant serenity. The pout of scarlet lips was still stubborn but not malicious, the arch of much darker than his hair, kind of golden eyebrows was insolent but not contemptuous. He didn’t lose any part of himself but took every single one to another, more mature, more sublime level. He was beautiful. He could inspire. He was worth looking at.

 

Harry doesn’t know if he should write him. Four days passed under gloomy Parisian sky, and although Harry doesn’t feel anything dark, and rotten, and _familiar_ tugging at his chest and nagging deafeningly, he still catches himself —at the breakfast table, in the afternoon’s crowded streets, on his lonely evening walks — catches himself looking at the sky, or rather examining it expectantly, and then pressing his lips together tight, as if it would be enough to not feel the stupid, utterly idiotic disappointment settling down somewhere deep inside his chest.

 

And then, it all vanishes away with a whirl of strong, beautiful wings of soft milky-white and warm, hazelnut-brown feathers, alternating each other in a gorgeous, truly unique pattern.

 

_Potter,_

_I got your letter weeks before Christmas, but I’m not going to apologize for not writing back any time sooner. I was too busy being conflicted. And then I saw you, of all people, on the Platform, and_

 

Harry just sees the long pale fingers with slightly pointed tips hesitating briefly before finishing the sentence

 

_I didn’t know what to do. For months I’ve been thinking about the possibilities of meeting someone from Hogwarts, and with every single face came the fear of being trapped in my memories. As if I’m not getting enough in sleep. Pansy, Blaise, Greg and even Theo already remind me of things that will probably drive me mental sooner or later, and you? Your face, the Saviour’s face, the face, the symbol of the War? I would expect quite a breakdown, but there was no such thing, and that was what petrified me the most._

_It didn’t hurt to see your face. And although I personally wouldn’t expect that we’re going to meet any time sooner or at all, I had something proven for me. I don’t know how and I don’t know why, but not seeing fire, not hearing the sound of_ his _voice, not feeling the electricity of Avada Kedavra being performed right in front of me, was essential for me, the moment I realized it was_ you _standing there. I can’t explain it to myself and I get angrier every time I try, because I fail miserably, so don’t expect anything from me — I don’t know. But facts are facts, Potter, my chest still feels like an unbearable burden, but if I accidentally bump into you somewhere in the street or hear the sound of your name somewhere near me, I’m not likely to be sick any more. And it’s a nice thing after all, because I’m only saying this once, Potter, I get attached easily. And it’s good to know that I’m attached to reading letters of a person who doesn’t make me feel like I’m about to puke out my insides and realize they all have gone rotten completely._

_Hope you had a nice Christmas yourself and I don’t know if you get this before or after December 31st, but Happy New Year, too. Enjoy Paris and eat a Bûche de Noël._

_Wishing to say hello to Granger and your Weasel as well, yet aware that they probably have no idea this letter exchange exists,_

_D. Malfoy_

_**P. S.** Gifts are not to return._

 

With demonically beathing heart and dreadfully shaking hands, Harry opens the little note attached to the letter.

 

_Wizarding Vienna is also famous for its birding business. My friend took me to the most famous Owlery, and although at first I had no intention to buy anything, one particular owl started following me around and whooing at me, rather annoyingly. At first I thought he hated me, but then the owner said that the bird actually liked me and was only trying to get me notice him. I know you’ve lost your owl and I certainly don’t do this in an attempt to replace your loss, but I still would like you to accept him as a Christmas present, just as something that immediately made me think of you. He’s also trained to take long flights well, so. I think it’s quite a match._

 

When Harry releases the breath he was damn well aware he was holding — chest and cheeks puffed, face darker than a pomegranate, eyes already bit red-rimmed and ridiculously wet — he looks at the bird. It, or he, apparently, looks back with huge, absolutely black shiny eyes, circled with millions of tiny white feathers, as if there are two cone-like funnels ending with two jet-black beads. He whoos at Harry somehow...tenderly and leans its big fluffy head to the right, still staring at the boy.

 

He should be relieved — he is. He should be embarrassed— he is. He should be grateful, he should be stricken, be shocked, awed, fucked up, utterly fucking terrified — he is all of the above. His reaction on Draco Malfoy is a bad one, and it’s just...it’s exhausting. Felling all this. Carrying it all in one heart, in one head. But he doesn't hate himself for experiencing this kind of emotions anymore. It feels like he manages to hate himself less in general.

 

With a heavy breath, Harry reaches out to the small fluttering feathers on the back of the owl’s head and strokes them tenderly with the tips of his fingers. The fever’s still roaring in his ears, he can’t breath through his stuffy nose so he inhales the chilly air in an uneven, broken, wet rhythm. He sounds like he’s drowning, although... he might as well. Drowning under the press of the words written on solid white paper, the words that burn him, the same that are echoed through the rush of his blood after each heartbeat.

 

Harry thinks he might be dreaming.

 

“Have to give you a name, don’t I,” he tries, clearing his throat with a soft cough.

 

He still looks at Harry, and there might be a little demanding curiosity in the depths of those enormous pebbles, as if just stolen from the deep waters of Scotland. Then the bird kind of growls, and it earns a small chuckle, falling from Harry’s lips.

 

“Right. Breakfast first.”

 

As Harry walks out of his room with the owl lounging peacefully on his shoulder, huge snowflakes begin to waltz down from the cool pewter sky.

 

***

 

“Harry, good mor—good grief, who’s this?” Bill exhales lightly, lips curving into a smile.

 

Four pairs of curious eyes are suddenly on Harry, and that’s what he certainly hasn’t thought about yet.

 

‘Hi lads, you see, my good pal Draco Malfoy took care of getting me a Christmas slash New Year present, and that’s how I ended up with a new owl. Happy New Year’s day to y'all from him, by the way!’

 

Smooth, Harry.

 

It’s not like he’s embarrassed of their newly formed friendship with his ex-arch nemesis; no. Harry has never been the one to particularly struggle with people’s opinions on his actions. Yet the bond is still so fragile, so odd and precious to him that he just knows he should keep this one to himself; only to himself. The side of overprotectiveness, determination and jealousy. Like a priceless charm you wear on a thin silver chain, tucked securely under all of your clothes.

 

“I, uh, I haven’t come up with the name yet,” Harry says, shrugging uncomfortably.

 

He doesn’t really understand the nature of silence after his words, if it’s tensed or encouraging, or just blunt; but then Fleur, bless her heart, smiles and stand up from her seat at the table.

 

“What a zweet c’reature,” she coos, walking towards Harry and half-squats so her eyes face the owl’s own unblinking eyes. “A’ren’t you beautiful?” she says, and all the consonant letters come out in soft and light breaths.

 

“It is very beautiful,” Ron says, joining Fleur in admiring the bird.

 

“It’s a barred owl,” Hermione says, looking at Harry with her brown eyes. “Not that commonly met among mail owls.”

 

“It looks like it’s gonna kill me,” Ron snorts but then breaks down in a smile. “Awww, look at that little beak!”

 

“It’s a he,” Harry says fondly. The beak is small, adorably curved and shockingly lemonish-yellow against dusty browns and warm whites of his feathers.

 

“A p’recu’rso’r of a gööd Zaint Sylveste’r,” Fleur purrs, straightening up.

 

“A what?” Bill asks, taking the kettle off the fire.

 

“Zaint Sylveste’r? Le San Seelvayst’r,” she repeats in French, shrugging then. “Zat’s what we call the New Yea’r’s Efe.”

 

“Maybe you should call him Sylvester,” Ron offers, grinning like a child. “What, it fits!”

 

“An owl called Sylvester,” Hermione chuckles and makes a face. “It’s too long.”

 

“Well Hermione isn’t short either,” Harry notices, shooting at her his most charming (shit-eating) smile. She stares at him, face blank, but cheeks heating up a little.

 

“Sylv for short,” Bill offers, laughing.

 

“Or Vester. Very masculine.”

 

The bird blinks at them expectantly.

 

***

 

There is no chance to write Draco an answer in the afternoon as well (for some reasons, Harry is almost grateful for that as he knows for sure all the can write now would embarrass him on levels unknown to Earth): he is sent to assist Fleur to the supermarket, because her mom and Bill are busy cooking and her father, Hermione and Ron are gone to collect Gabrielle — Fleur’s little sister — and her grandparents from their countryside cottage.

 

“I ztill can’t believe I’m so lucky to have a huzband who cookz,” Fleur laughs as they make their way into busy streets. “I’m bad at eve’rything zat is not spaghetti.”

 

“Very French,” Harry snorts and hears her laughter.

 

“And he lovez cooking chicken bi’ryani and lamb vindaloo ze most, how ve’ry English.”

 

“Actually, loving Indian is very English,” Harry protests. “It’s either McDonalds or Indian for like eighty percent of Londoners, and another twenty are just snobbish.”

 

“I love falafel takeaway. Ze’re’s a very famous falafel place not zat fa’r f’rom us, we should go one day.”

 

“We should, yeah. I have only eaten falafel once and don’t quite remember the taste.”

 

Talking to Fleur is easy, Harry discovers. She has a great sense of humour, she loves sharing stories and asks good, laconic questions so Harry doesn’t feel like he’s the awkwardly silent one (although he a little bit is). He lets her talk and laughs and wonders, and a little later Fleur says that they’re not going to the nearest grocery but to the other one, just so they could walk a little more.

 

“We p’robably won’t go out again today, and I just hate staying at home all day,” she admits when they step on the famous painters’ street. “It to’rtures me a little,” she chuckles, and Harry nods understandingly.

 

There are still people on the square, and even a couple of painters smile politely at them as Harry inspects the drawings they sell. A lot of cartoonists, modern art followers, masters of pencil and charcoal portraits as well. Watercolour, oil paintings, the Eiffel Tower in millions of techniques. The painters are all different, too. Some of them are properly artistic, with old worn berets and colourful, patterned scarves tied around their necks. With tiny spectacles on the top of their noses and vintage coats and jackets. Some of them are in woolen jean jackets, right jeans hugging their knees pretentiously and small hats that show off the tips of their ears and let the hair curl on the nape of their necks. Some women wear long gypsy-like skirts and some prefer wide velvet trousers. Younger artists, there is a few of them, are shaking in their sneakers and biker jackets, the tips of their noses alarmingly red. But almost all of them smoke, some in groups, some of them alone, sneaking up snobbish glasses to the left and to the right.

 

“Fleur?” Harry blurts out suddenly, his thoughts not quite catching up with his mouth.

 

“Yes, ‘a’rry?”

 

“Do you maybe happen to know if there are any nice art shops in Paris? My friend,” he says, awkward as ever, “is a painter and I still haven’t bought him a Christmas present.”

 

She bites her lip and begins thinking, elegant brows furrowed a little. The best thing about her is, she never asks funny questions. Maybe that's what they call the French finesse, it probably has something to do with the mentality. In the end, gracefully avoiding uncomfortable moments in a dialogue is an art, something people either do or do not learn from the very childhood. Or maybe he’s overthinking and it’s just Fleur.

 

“I know one inte’resting atelie’r not fa’r from he’re, they do handmade paints. Zey use ze classic Ancient Egypt technique, wo’rk with mine’rals and clay. We could go ze’re beefo’re you leave, if you'd like it, I think zey’re clozed today.”

 

Harry bites his lip and hides his fists in the pockets of his coat, nails digging up in the flesh of his palms mercilessly. He looks almost triumphant.

 

“It would be great, actually, thank you very much.”

 

She shoots him a mock-coquettish look and chuckles, and that is what alarms Harry the next second. His lets his smile slip away, lets his heart out on a no-winning race with his blood pressure, and just melts into panic, pathetically, helplessly and ultimately gayly. He may be an idiot but he’s not stupid, he can tell when someone’s got dirt on him.

 

And Fleur, who hasn’t taken her eyes off of him, presses her lips together, hiding her smile and letting him to choose — to either gracefully move onto another conversation or not — and turns her head towards the road, and Harry just keeps breathing hard and staring at her, eyes nothing but fucking petrified as they keep walking. He opens his mouth and closes it a couple of times, resisting the urge to stab himself for wanting to say something (because this won’t end up good, what could he possibly say, good god), yet desperately needing to ask her, what the fuck is going on. Because something definitely is. You don’t smirk at people like that and expect them to be fine, he’s known Fred and George Weasley for years.

 

“Fleur,” Harry then tries, as cool and collected as he can, “what is it?”

 

She looks at him again and shrugs lightly, her beautiful blue eyes gleaming softly and amicably, and Harry does really calm down a little.

 

“Jüst a stoopid assumption, ‘a’rry, I’m so’rry for getting you so wo’rried.”

 

“What assumption?” he draws out weakly.

 

She sighs, but she doesn’t look apologetic. Harry likes it and hates it at the same time.

 

“It’s Gab’rielle. See, as siste’rs, we’re ‘really close, and zometimes she tells me things zat...accidentally d’raw he’r attention,” she starts talking, and yes, based on the way she looks at him it is absolutely, completely clear that Harry’s miserable moron-esque mug has just confirmed everything she needed to know about her “stoopid assumption”. How the fuck could he forget that Gabrielle also attends Beauxbatons. It all clicks suddenly, and Harry winces. 

 

“It’s the letters, right?”

 

“Yeah,” she nods with a soft, inoffensive chuckle. “It’s just, zey sha’re watercolour painting classes, and zat waz when she sta’rted noticing him fi’rst...”

 

“Noticing him first?”

 

Fleur makes a face and sighs, and Harry probably would feel dumb, but now he’s kind of occupied.

 

“He’s p’retty. Zat’s it. She said he was p’etty once and then got a little bit obzessed. And started to notice zat he gets letters f’om ‘ogwarts. A lot of them. And he paints also. Fin de l’histoire.”

 

Fleur is a really, really smart witch. Too bad Harry’s a pretty fucking dumb wizard.

 

“I won’t tell anyone,” she says after a couple of silent seconds, and Harry feels her fingers curling around his bicep. “If you don’t wish zem to know.”

 

“I don’t, it’s true,” Harry says, his voice barely a whisper.

 

It’s actually funny how the tendency to find comfort in company of the most unexpected people can’t stop establishing itself in his life.

 

“Gab’rielle says he lookz like hiz mom’s a Veela.”

 

“He does, but she’s not. She’s also a very, very beautiful woman, but I don’t think she’s a Veela.”

 

Fleur laughs and her grip tightens for a brief moment.

 

“It’s a F’rench saying. We don’t usually mean it, we only want to say how go’rgeous a pe’rson iz.”

 

Harry smiles then, relieved. He’s relieved because for some reasons he trusts Fleur, and also because, apart from Mr Diler, she’s the first person to know about Draco. And it’s oddly comforting, it feels like a small part of Harry’s family has just accepted their friendship, although he has never really considered Fleur a part of his family, either. And yet, it feels exactly like it.

 

It’s only hours later when Harry realizes he accidentally told Fleur that he thinks that Draco Malfoy is...beautiful.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> yet again i don’t think i’ll ever be tired of thanking you for leaving kudos and such wonderful comments. it means so much for me, i mean it. i can’t say i’m super active on tumblr but if you’d like to rant about any hp related stuff or...well literally anything — i’m @dracovsbuckbeak on there. feel free to hit me up


	8. i need to make it right

 

 

**Dear Draco,**

 

Harry writes down and his gaze locks up on six little vials, filled with coloured dust. Of course they costed him a fortune, but oddly enough, he didn’t feel even a little bit reluctant, letting go of his money. His body wasn’t, but his little heart was shivering in anticipation. He wasn’t so sure Draco would like his present, it’s a fifty/fifty game — he might as well sneer and the paints and conclude that it’s the most pathetic gift anyone has ever gotten him; but there’s something extremely exciting in the thought of Draco getting his present, it’s a childish, purest idea of being happy to give someone else something they might like, especially when it’s someone who...someone like Draco.

 

Harry thinks he’d spend any amount of money if he would feel it had a potential to please Draco Malfoy. Just because the fucking git made him cry with his present. Harry deserves to at least make him smile.

 

 

**I think we’re even now, as I’ve spent almost a week thinking of a proper reaction to your letter. No, actually, I reacted just fine reading it, if you consider a roller-coaster piggyback hell-ride of emotions “fine”; and yet, I just couldn’t find the right words to write down.**

**Hope you didn’t find the roller-coarser part offensive, because I didn’t mean anything bad. It’s just...I didn’t expect it. From anyone, this level of intimacy and openness. And then it came from you, not someone, not just anyone, but you, who’s vulnerability I’ve been considering mythological, to the point of non-existent. It was a revelation for me. And I honest to god freaked out, because**

Harry hesitates only for a minute.

 

**I don’t want to accidentally hurt your feelings (only on purpose, in case you’ve misunderstood). And that could easily be arranged, because I might not me the best to show out empathy. But I do. Empathize, I mean. I know what you’re talking about, I feel for you. God, I feel for you so much, Draco. Everything hurt, everything still hurts, seeing George hurts, seeing Teddy hurts; Ron has scars, Hermione has wrinkles, Hogwarts is still in reparations. And it feels like**

 

With a missed heartbeat, Harry realizes, it’s either dump the letter and start a new one right now or no coming back.

**it’s my fault. I could’ve gone there sooner. I could’ve made sure everyone was safe first. I could’ve never come back to Hogwarts, at fucking first, and had shit done somewhere else, somewhere far, where no one would be in danger. And most importantly, I had no right to come back to life. Twice. Fucking twice. It’s like I’m better than them, who’s long gone now. It’s like I deserve not even a second, a third bloody chance to not mess up this time and...not fucking die. Is it fair? How is it fair, when it’s me who had and still has nothing, no one to lose? How is it fair when it’s me who “deserved” to come back, when there are parents, brothers and sisters, sons and daughters who did not?**

 

Harry feels his lungs burning, and it’s only then that he knows he’s shaking, his cheeks wet, his nose stuffed and teeth firmly squeezed.

 

It suddenly occurs to him that Draco also writes to him. He can’t see the process, but he knows it’s happening, because there’s no doubt every single word Draco’s written was true. And if it hurt Harry that much, then what must Draco feel? He thinks, and the thinks, and he thinks just like Harry, he has all the words tasted in his mouth and all the letters burnt on the back of his scalp. He’s as miserable as Harry is, even if he doesn’t cry like Harry does, or catch his breath after a paragraph or two (or a sentence; or a word). He’s very much like Harry Potter, and Harry Potter is pretty much like him. In a far too different way, but. Still.

 

**Great. And now I’m frustrated and confused.**

 

Harry lets out a wet laugh.

 

**I wasn’t planning to go on like this. I wasn’t planning to trust you this much.**

 

And yet, there hasn’t been one thought of ripping up the last part of his letter; of not sending it.

 

**But it’s only fair. Or, screw fair, it feels right. I’m going to say something only once as well — I have trust issues and tend to overanalyze my every word, so hope it doesn’t bother you that sometimes it spills out on paper as well.**

 

A soft whirl of strong wings greets Harry from the opened window, and looking up, he meets a pair of always-curious black iris-less. There’s also a small white mouse in the owl’s beak, and it looks positively dead.

 

“Jesus, Sylv,” Harry snorts, although it sounds like a sob instead. “This is disgusting.”

 

 **On a better note, your present is my favourite this year. I didn’t even think of returning it, hope you were just being a moron about it. But seriously, Draco, thank you. He’s the loveliest, and we decided on calling him Sylvester. Fleur said he was like a precursor of a good New Year, that they actually call Saint-Sylvester, and it kind of stuck. I don’t mind of you hate it, by the way, it’s my owl now.**

 

His attention then decides to get lost again, and the next thing Harry knows he’s thinking of is Gabrielle Delacour.

 

Needles to say, in the last couple days his almost unexplainable enmity against the young girl has only grown harder. He decides to not inform Draco about her crush on him, because first of all, he’s not a gossip and it would be terribly, terribly unfair to both her and Fleur as well. And secondly, the girl is almost as pretty as her older sister is. What’s worse than accidentally starting something that will one day eat you alive.

 

**And about my present. Unfortunately, I can’t say anything pretencious like “saw this and thought of you”, but I think you might as well find it interesting. As much as I know, these paints are made according to the Ancient Egypt paint-making rules, and the man who sold me the kit kindly preserved me from re-telling you the exploitation guide and wrote it down in a note that you can find inside the box. Although I don’t think I understood everything he wanted to say (his English was not really eloquent and I can only greet you in French), I rather enjoyed the story of paint-making in the Ancient World. I think it’s cool that there still are people who preserve techniques this old, although it might not be salable these days.**

**I also didn’t tell anyone that Sylv was your present. And yes, even Ron and Hermione don’t know we...keep in touch. Otherwise I would definitely have told them you’d said hi.**

 

**By the way. How is your Mother? I hope she’s doing great; I mean it. If I wasn’t sure you didn’t tell a soul about my love confession, I would’ve sent her my regards.**

 

She saved his life, after all.

 

**Wishing you too the Happiest New Year (again),**

**Harry**

Draco Malfoy is the most exhausting person in the World.

 

***

 

Hogwarts feels sadder than ever. With the end of their last ever winter break, there is nothing separating them from upcoming N. E. W. T.s, and although Harry doesn’t really give a shit about his possible results, the idea of graduating scares the shit out of him.

 

He knows for sure he does not want to and will certainly not force himself to join the Auror training program. But at the same time, he still has no idea what else he could do, and he still hasn’t told Ron and everyone else about it; and yet again, Harry Potter is a wrecked mess when he returns to Hogwarts.

 

It’s also that he’s extremely overwhelmed, and frustrated, and so, so fucking tired all the time, even when he hasn’t really done anything. Maybe figuring out what you want to do with your life is easier when you don’t wish you were dead most of the time.

 

“Sometimes I think of dropping out, but this would be an ultimate dick-move,” Harry admits feverishly in the end, while having tea with Mr Diler — who he kindly decides to enlighten about his future plans (or the lack of them) — and blushes furiously a moment later, realizing his language could actually be more...eloquent than that.

 

But the old man only chuckles instead.

 

“Why would it be a dick-move?”

 

Harry lets out a sigh of relief that quickly turns into a frustrated grumble.

 

“Because I would get away with this. No one would object, maybe except Hermione, although a lot of people would be disappointed. I just...I don’t know,” Harry shrugs helplessly, sipping his tea. “I don’t want it. I would blame myself forever.”

 

Mr Diler answers him with a little smile and gives him more of those little sweet things, made of flour, drenched in honey and decorated with half of a walnut. They’re delicious.

 

“Cannot you take a break?”

 

“A break?”

 

“Some time off. To think,” the man explains, lighting his cigarette. “While you’re not under pressure.”

 

Harry opens his mouth to say that he’s never considered this as an option, but then the door opens with a whistle and Luna lets inside a wave of cold, icy air. She smiles when she sees them both, and although nothing could have had her ready to encounter Harry as well as Mr Diler, her face remains steady and unbothered.

 

Her milk-white cheeks are blossoming with January cold and her hair looks like pale gold in the room’s lights. She looks like a breathing painting as she moves towards the table, and Mr Diler stands up to greet her with two light kisses on both of her cheeks. Hot steaming tea runs quickly into Turkish pear-shaped glasses, and the three of them are all smiles and laughs, while behind the closed door transparent pink winter sky lets the sun kiss it goodbye.

 

***

 

_Potter,_

_I may not be the best at comforting people, but I swear, I had absolutely no idea how, in fact, fucked up you are. I’m sorry for this, I’m afraid, I will never find words loud enough to describe how sorry for you I felt while reading your letter for the first time, but I honest to God felt unwell. This is not how you’re supposed to feel, I don’t think you are. Of course, I don’t and can’t know better, but what you described doesn’t feel like winning; it feels like losing._

 

Harry’s own heart clenches at this, too. _He speaks with Harry’s words. This is exactly what it feels like._

_I’m aware that a lot of people don’t ever get tired of reminding you what you did for the Wizarding world. I know that you know you saved millions of people. But I also know this is not what you remember; you remember people you couldn’t save. And this is the mystery of our heads, I think, because no matter how many good things we know about us, about anything, we prefer remembering bad ones. How ridiculous of us. But I don’t think that could be changed, ever._

_I told you I was bad at comforting people._

 

Harry bites down a soft smile.

 

_I agree that not giving anyone else a second chance is unfair. I agree with a lot things you said, but Potter, no matter how powerful you are, you can’t change anything. No matter how much you hate and torture yourself, how hard you make yourself suffer, the only thing you’ll be able to affect is the state of your mental health. I’m not telling you to get over it, I don’t think this is something you can actually get over, but you should forgive yourself. And move on. We all should move on, we have to. That’s the only thing we can do. It’s either this or rotting in the ghosts of our memories till our last heartbeat._

_I’m also probably not the best person to tell you all this, considering my own condition. But I already feel like there are too many ‘buts’ in my letter, I don’t like it. I can’t decide if I like the name Sylvester or detest it, too, but it’s not like I give a shit, in the end. I’m just glad it suits him._

_As for your gift, I’m not going to lie, I was impressed. I know the shop you visited, I know the owner, but I’ve never considered buying the set you gave me before. I’m still new to it all, I’ve just started to find myself adjusted to watercolour, but there’s always room for trying out something else. Maybe it would be even easier to start oil painting after being introduced to the Ancient Egypt’s materials. I’m eager to see what’s it going to turn out like._

_Thank you, Potter. I appreciate it a lot. And thank you even more for caring about my feelings so much, but don’t flatter yourself — you’re not that important. Not like I didn’t enjoy your questioning monologue about the existence of my soul — I found it rather amusing — but don’t act like you don’t know I don’t need your empathy. I’m perfectly fine. I don’t write letters in order to get a reaction; an answer is enough to leave me satisfied._

 

Of course, Harry knew Draco is not stupid. But letter after every letter, he finds himself fucking fascinated with his intelligence, with his mind, although one might not find them extraordinary. Hearing Draco pronounce every word he wrote down is so easy, too, because even though they’ve never had (and probably never going to have) a proper conversation, Harry is familiar with the way he speaks. And Draco writes just like that, it’s not something everyone do, and certainly not something particularly admirable; and yet.

 

_And my Mother is fine, thank you, again, for asking. As far as I know she’s been busy taking care of family business, I don’t know if she’s succeeding, it might not be easy, considering she’s out of England, but let’s just hope she won’t have to go back there._

_Wouldn’t want to see me again, am I right, Potter?_

_Hoping that you enjoyed your time in Paris and wishing you the best of luck with your studies, because our exams are closer than they’ve ever been,_

_D. Malfoy_

 

After reading the letter, Harry sits in his chair and stares at the distance, at nothing in particular, his vision unfocused, chest rising up and down slowly. His head hurts a little bit, right in the center of his forehead, but it’s not intolerable.

 

The letter gets read again. Slower this time, not as if to savour what was remaining there after the first reading, because Harry saw everything; but to hear his own decision. Draco is right, he can’t change some things, and just like that, he can’t change the paths his own self decides to follow, for Harry’s head and his mind are seldom cooperative with each other. Whether it will accept Draco’s words or forget them as soon as Harry’s head hits his pillow; whether they have been _heard_ or just read. Whether he believes Draco or not.

 

His headache grows harder to ignore. If it wasn’t for the first part of the letter, Harry knows he would’ve been smiling like a motherfucking fool at the thought of Draco liking his present. He would’ve also been analyzing his words about the way Draco feels towards empathy and admiring the adamant art of self-preservation he’s mastered brilliantly. But he’s not, not right now, at least. It’s much more complicated than this.

 

Harry holds the letter delicately in his fingers and inspects all the curves of Draco’s handwriting, although his gaze is blind and his mind is drowned in thoughts. He’s suddenly very, very tired. His breathing comes out of his chest quick, ripped. There are droplets of sweat on his temples, he wants nothing but to feel the soothing coolness of his pillows in the silence of his dorm, while all the other kids are in Hogsmeade.

 

He should spend a night with this thought. With Draco Malfoy’s voice in his head, telling him to forgive himself. The darkness in his chest resists, and Harry doesn’t even know who he’s betting on.

 

He plomps on his bed, barely managing to kick off his sweats, and lets his eyes travel down the marble-white of the paper once again. He’s probably just hyperventilating, he thinks.

 

Too bad Harry doesn’t think he doesn’t want to see Draco ever again, now. As much as he wouldn’t want it to be a confession, it sort of is.

 

 


	9. you're my head, you're my heart

 

The first time, he wakes up to the sound of his grinding teeth. 

 

This is an absolutely fucking unbearable, horrible sound, bone-piercing, blood-freezing and nauseous. Shivering from head to toe, Harry wakes up, abruptly sitting up in his bed, still alone in the room. He’s taking deep but quick breaths, as if he’s been longing for air in his lungs, as if he’s been drowning and finally managed to reach the surface. His fingers are in pain, and when he moves them he realizes he must’ve been clenching up the sheets so tight that they went numb. 

 

And then, like he always does, he turns his head to the left and registers, with the messed up eyesight of his, the dawn. The sky is clear, not even a sight of a cloud there is, and is so, so mesmerizing in its simplicity that the ice is jealous. Endless miles of the frozen Lake are jealous of the cool blue, dotted with yet weak, transparent speckles of stars, only starting to lighten up. Of the milky-white line where it melts into daffodil-yellow; of the burning sun that still resists the darkness of the hills. But the ice also predicts the fall of it, ironically, for it is darker then the already sleeping forests, than the shadow of the castle; and Harry watches it muffle mercilessly the last fierce outcry of the brightest star. 

 

Gradually, the colour silently follows its origin and leaves only a trace of soft baby-blue; and it is a promise to come back again, to lighten up even the gloomiest depths of the Lake, and keep fighting the ice every day, until many nights later it is gone, and rises up the cheer of the bluest water again and smiles back to the sun and the clear sky the reflection it carries within. 

 

“God, I’m seeing things,” Harry mumbles and bends his arms at the elbows to let his body fall back and closes his eyes again, casting a silencing charm around his bed, because he forgot to do it the last time. His head still hurts like a bitch. 

 

***

 

His second awakening is different, but it’s no less horrible. 

 

Harry’s skin is so hot and sticky it  _itches_ , and it feels like he’s in a fucking vaporarium. He lets out a small desperate groan when he realizes there’s no way he’s able to continue his sleep, for it’s still the only thing he’s craving more than temporary coma, and kicks off the last bits of unconsciousness. 

 

He was dreaming of fire. Again. Of Fiendfyre, but he was not in the Room of Requirement. He doesn’t remember much, but he remembers being a child again, not more than ten years old, locked up in his cupboard under the stairs in the Dursleys’ house. He remembers crying, and touches his cheeks only to find them wet. He was crying and screaming, begging to be let out of there, as the roaring diabolical heat of the curse approached, but no one would open the door. And he remembers grey eyes, staring at him in horror from the little slit in the door, and he remembers realizing then that there was no door, that he was trapped in a room with no enter, doomed to be devoured by the blind and bright dragon, made of fire and rage. 

 

His body aches for someone to be held by. Right, he’s not in the damned cupboard, but he’s alone again, and it’s dark, and hot, and silent. He’s in the middle of his bed, palms clammy and huge droplets of sweat rolling down his spine, and he desperately needs someone. Only to remind him he’s not ten anymore, that he’s not unloveable, that he’s cared for.  _Touch-starved._

 

Harry gathers all the remains of his will-power and slips out of the bed. A shower is always the best idea, and although the bathroom light pierces his eyes and February-cold water sends shivers down his whole body, he steps out of it feeling slightly better. Much better, actually. At least he doesn’t want to rip off his itching and burning skin anymore. 

 

Casting a cleansing charm on his sheets and putting on a fresh t-shirt, he looks at the sky and finds it almost eggplant-purple, with what it seems to be thousands of stars covering it in chaotic, yet exceptionally organized way. He doesn’t fight an urge to open the window, as in the room occupied by five boys there is hardly anything breathable, and lets in a blow of harsh winter air. 

 

Neverminding his wet hair and half naked body, Harry climbs under the covers and gets ready to fall asleep slowly and torturously. 

 

He’s accepted into the Dreamlands no slower than before. 

 

*** 

 

And when Harry wakes up for the third time, he’s positive he’s about to die. 

 

His nose is stuffy, and his lips are so dry that if he smiles once they’ll crack up in several places. The taste on his tongue is cat-piss shitty, and if before he’d had a basic headache, now his skull feels like an atom bomb, threatening to explode if he accidentally flinches. 

 

“Mate, what the fuck,” he hears Ron grumble, and indeed a sharp blade of pain digs through Harry’s brain when he moves his eyes. He lets out a small cry. 

 

“Who _t_ _he fuck_ opens the window in the middle of January and then bloody  _sleeps_ in front of it?” he proceeds to raise up the panic in the room, shutting the window. 

 

“Was hot,” Harry mumbles, closing his eyes. “Couldn’t sleep.” 

 

“Should’ve taken a shower!” 

 

Harry doesn’t really think before blurting our that he did, actually, take a shower.

 

“What?” Ron squeaks, high-pitched, and when Harry reflexively bursts his eyes open again, for a few seconds, he doesn’t feel his head anymore. 

 

“Ron, I think he’s sick,” Harry hears Neville’s soft voice as he goes unconscious, for the fourth time in less than twelve hours. 

 

“Of  course he’s sick, a decent fucking human being—“ 

 

“Shut the fuck up, wanker, he’s in pain!” 

 

“I think he has a fever. God, he’s burning!” it would be really nice to lean into the touch of cool, boyishly-sticky fingers on his forehead and cheeks, but...it’s hard. 

 

Harry only manages to howl encouragingly before everything goes blank. 

 

***

 

** Dear Draco,  **

** I hyperventilated after reading your last letter and now am dying of fever in the Hospital Wing. I’m telling you this (although I know how extraordinarily dumb it sounds), because I’m obliged to write in a half-lying position, and therefore, you might find my handwriting...slightly worse than usual.  **

He’s lying. It is fucking horrible. And it’s him and not Draco, who finds Harry’s normal handwriting atrocious. 

 

**To be honest, I don’t know what happened. You just got me...thinking. And then I went to bed and**

 

Harry pauses, frowning.  **I went to bed and my sleep was ten times worse than usual because of your letter** is not a nice thing to say. Or, whatever, it’s not a thing Harry would like to tell Draco. 

 

** woke up with a fever.  **

Nice job, Harry. Coquettishly pathetic; but what else is new. 

 

He crosses out the last sentence, then thinks better and summons a new piece of parchment. 

 

** Dear Draco,  **

 

he writes again, really challenging himself to make the letters look at least a little more appropriate. 

 

** I hyperventilated after reading your last letter and now am dying of fever in the Hospital Wing. I’m telling you this (although I know how extraordinarily dumb it sounds), because I’m obliged to write in a half-lying position, and therefore, you might find my handwriting...slightly worse than usual. And I’m rewriting this for the second time, as my first try was basically unreadable, so I would gladly advice you to stick your complaints as far up your ass as possible, if there are any.  **

** Thank you.  **

And all of a sudden, lacking any comprehensible things to say and yet eager to say something, annoyed as hell to rewrite the whole thing and feeling a little bit miserable, Harry decides to get fucking mad. 

 

** I also would like to express my gratitude for your wonderful piece of advice. You know, I just find it funny how  **

 

One part of Harry already feels sorry and demands wholeheartedly that he stops, but the other...the other one puts the pedal to the metal. 

 

**of all the people, it’s you who tells me to forgive myself and to move on. And not because all the mistakes you’ve made, not because you’re Marked or whatever, but because you’re a hypocritical fucking moron who’s oh willing to teach me shit while buried deep inside the same bloody pit. **

Okay, Harry’s not really sure if it’s hypocrisy he’s trying to call Draco out for, but it sounds well enough to write it down anyway. 

 

**I know I told you in my first letter that I don’t give a fuck whether you feel bad for your past or not, but I do _now_ , and while I’m in the mood, I would like to point out that while  _my_ hatred for myself is perfectly understandable and is nothing but miserable, the way  _you_ loathe yourself is truly fucking terrifying. It’s unhealthy, and unnatural, and too cruel, even for you, and I just don’t understand it. **

** I’m not trying to justify you, I know what you did was wrong, but it’s not like you had much choice. Everyone knows this, even those who hate you, but screw those people, I don’t, for fuck’s sake. I know you better than them, my opinion is based on actual things I know and I’ve seen, and still, all I get is a good ol’  _ fuck you Potter, I’m the evilest person in the World and deserve nothing but hate till the end of my very existence. _ **

__

** This, and  _ come on Potter, you’re too fixated on the past, forgive yourself, accept your deeds and move the fuck on._ **

 

He really challanges his inner calligraphist while imitating Draco's voice in his head and his handwriting on the parchment. 

 

** Draco, if I don’t hate you (and pardon my impudence, but I have the most rights to do so), it means you don’t deserve to be hated. You are not a bad person.  **

** Sincerely hoping to be heard, because your hatred towards yourself is fucking exhausting and stupid and ridiculous,  **

** Harry  **

 

***

 

Madam Pomfrey leaves him in the Hospital Wing with a high fever caused by both mental and physical exhaustion and poor life decisions. But Harry doesn’t see this as a bad thing — he sleeps well, dosed with different kinds of antibiotic potions and Dreamless Sleep and thinks a lot, and although he doesn’t come to any reasonable conclusions, it feels like a progress. The only conclusion he actually comes to by the end of the day he sends his almost-Howler angry letter to Draco, is that he should write another one. And probably invent a charm to call back his owl. 

 

So the morning of his second day in the Hospital Wing, feeling bit more troubled but altogether better because his fever seems to be calmed down,Harry finds a huge Herbology encyclopedia, places it on his laps as he sits cross-legged on the bed, and, finding this position much more comfortable, begins to write. 

 

** Dear Draco,  **

** I’m not going to say that I didn’t mean my last letter, because I sure did, but I actually didn’t intend to say it all in such  **

 

Harry frowns, almost annoyed again. Then he realizes he’s actually scowling at the piece of parchment for he’s not able to produce a decent fucking sentence and decides to let it go. In order to not embarrass himself any further. 

 

** an aggressive manner. It’s true, I don’t think that the hate you feel towards yourself is a) deserved b) appropriate c) healthy and I do think you should reconsider your advice as well, but it doesn’t mean you can tell me nothing if you have the same shit to deal with.  **

** In fact,  **

 

Harry bites his lower lip and sighs. 

 

** I have to admit I would’ve done the same. I mean, about advising people stuff while I myself haven’t even considered it decent enough to follow. I had plenty of time to think while in feverish agony, and I think we’re not that different, Draco. And I absolutely didn’t need to go on like that in my previous letter. I was just really, really upset. Because I don’t want to see you struggle, and I know you do.  **

** I also know you have a hard time acknowledging that people can love you and care about you. You’re not unlovable, don’t fucking pretend you don’t know this. Hope you still have my first letter to make sure I mean it. I loved you, and even if it’s been a long time, I still care about you. I don’t know why I did back then, but I know why I do now. You were raised in an extremely unhealthy household, expected to be like your father for your whole life, although he had never been someone anyone should look up to (full offense, I’m not taking it back), forced to share a house with Voldemort, who had you wrapped around his finger because he knew your parents were the only thing you care about. I’m not making an attempt to analyze your entire life, but I know it’s built on control people had over you. And although you keep saying everyone has a choice, I don’t think anyone would’ve acted differently, if they had been you. No one seems to know this, but I do, and that’s why I care.  **

 

** I wonder if you’re going to send me a large FUCK OFF sign in neon with your next letter. Fuck. You probably don’t know what neon is.  **

** So, yeah. This is not an apology, but I felt uneasy last night and this morning, and since I still have nothing better to do, you’ll have to survive my letter attacks. If you’re...willing to, of course.  **

** I remember being conflicted when you said you’re writing letters in order to get an answer and not a reaction.  **

 

“Harry!” 

 

He tilts his head up at the sound of Hermione’s concerned voice and concludes that Madam Pomfrey thought he’s already well enough to have visitors, because yesterday she adamantly forbade it, insisting he was too weak. He bites his lip again, a nervous habit he seems to has gained, and goes on determinedly. 

 

** Now I’m pretty sure my Hogwarts years wouldn’t be half as pleasing as they were because of my constant need of getting a reaction from you.  **

 

Unfortunately, Harry has absolutely no time to filter his words. 

 

** Fuck, I have to go now, Hermione and Ron are here to visit me and I hate finishing letters later because of inevitable mood differences.  **

“Harry? Do you think she could’ve isolated him?” 

 

“From whom? Nobody else’s here.” 

 

** Love,  **

** Harry  **

 

As fast as he can, he tucks the book and the letter under his pillow, and seconds later his best friends finally manage to find his bed. 

 

“What makes you so—Harry!” 

 

He first gets a warm hug from Hermione, her little quick fingers on his back and wild curls of hair nothing but blocking his vision, and then Ron pats his shoulder a little awkwardly, muttering something like “good-to-see-you-mate”, sitting on the chair beside the bed. Hermione stays right next to him, their sides pressed lightly against each other. 

 

They come back in the evening, too, with his favourite treacle tart snatched from the Great Hall. House Elves feed him well, amazing actually, but he’s apparently not allowed to eat anything not ultra-nutritious, and he just misses stuffing himself with shit. Or nothing at all. Pomfrey won’t let him be if he doesn’t finish his food. 

 

They talk a lot, surprisingly. For some reasons, it felt like he wasn’t quite there and they were not, too, after Paris, and it feels like meeting them after a long separation. He got into his head again, not managing to carry the weight of his everyday life, but it happens then that even if it’s for one night, Harry allows himself to melt into the sweet sounds of Ron and Hermione’s voices, and warmth, and touches. 

 

He uses a school owl after their leave to deliver his second letter to Malfoy, not daring himself to reread what he wrote. He’s not the one to regret things, so it’s better this way than rewriting it a hundred times. 

 

And it’s only when he’s staring at the little dark dot of the bird, approaching the width and heaviness or the night sky, that he thinks about the last thing he quickly scribbled down. _Love, Harry_. His heart clenches and the familiar wave of anxiety raises up in his whole body, but he remembers, once again, that regretting things is not his way of being. Everything happens for a reason, and if he felt like writing it, well then. He doesn’t know, funnily enough, whether it’s just a cliche everyone uses in their letters or something his heart decides to to add. Because if yesterday’s letter’s message was a crystal clear _I’ve never hated you,_ today’s one was different in many ways. 

 

Harry hopes he managed to deliver a simple _you can be loved_. 

 

***

 

The next day Luna brings him a package of Turkish sweets from Mr Diler, and Hagrid spends about an hour at the Hospital wing with Harry, until he has to go back to his classes. In the evening, Ron and Hermione come back with their homework, and even though Harry’s hardly in the mood for homework, he does it with them anyway, feeling grateful and oddly greedy for a company. 

 

“No idea why we do that,” Ron sighs at some point, leaning into the seat. “They’ve already accepted us into the training, it’s not like they’ll reject us if we have all As for our NEWTs.” 

 

Hermione scoffs at him, but proceeds writing her essay. Harry, on the other hand, shifts uncomfortably, throwing a quick glance at her, but keeping his eyes on Ron. 

 

“What if,” he starts, then clears his throat, as the words come out weaker than to his liking. “What if you’re not sure? The results are relevant for three years since exams, it’s more than enough to decide.” 

 

The wind behind the closed windows grows stronger as Harry stares at Ron, who doesn’t seem to notice anything. But Hermione’s already looking at him, the sentence she’s been writing abandoned, unfinished. Harry meets her gaze, soft, and a little bit curious, and a whole lot encouraging, and realizes that she knows. The way she points at Ron, moving her head slightly, is enough for a proof. 

 

“Well good for them,” Ron shrugs, still unaware of the situation. “But I still—“

 

“Ron,” Harry interrupts him softly, putting down his quill. “I don’t want to be an Auror.” 

 

His eyes, a softer, more tea-ish than Hermione’s Ebony tree brown, freeze on him, incredibly widened. This, his dust pink parted lips, and an vein on his neck, trembling alarmingly enough. Here comes a good ol’ Weasley tantrum. 

 

“What?” 

 

Hermione bites down a smile. Harry’s jealous. 

 

“I refused the Ministry’s invitation months ago. I only came back to Hogwarts because I don’t know what to do.” 

 

“You  _what_ ,” Ron literally squeaks, with that bloody-fuck-there’s-a-spider kind of squeak, but like, stronger. Harry feels honoured. “Mate...”

 

Harry exhales, fighting the urge to look down, because he’s  not _guilty_ of anything. Maybe only of waiting that long to tell him. 

 

“But  _Harry_ _,_ ” he screeches, his body tensed, back straight, fingers squeezing the arms of his chair. 

 

“Ronald,” Hermione demands, covering his knuckles with her hand. 

 

“Hermione!” he exclaims, obviously feeling very attacked. “He’s wanted it since forever!” he looks back at Harry and repeats: “You’ve wanted it since forever!” 

 

“Not anymore,” Harry tries, an apology written all over his face. “I don’t want to spend my whole life fighting anyone, Ron, I realized that seven years is enough. For me, personally.” 

 

“And...” Ron’s face is already blotted with beet-coloured stains as he keeps opening and closing his mouth like a newly caught fish. “What are you planning to do then?” 

 

“I told you I don’t know.” 

 

Of course, Ron proceeds with having a hysteria, denying the whole situation, making Pomfrey rush up to them and giving each of them a brilliant opportunity to experience her displeasure, that is, with all due respect, much more terrifying than Ron’s. Him and Hermione get kicked out of the Hospital Wing soon after that, and Harry mouths a sorry to Hermione for leaving her to deal with Ron on her own. She shakes her head with a small smile instead, and Harry thinks that maybe it’s for the best. Yeah, everything is for the best.

 

He feels so much lighter that night. And when they return to visit Harry exactly twenty four hours later, Ron blurts out a quick “I’m sorry, mate”, which makes Harry grin brighter than the sun in the middle of July. Ron still tries to grumble here and there and attempts to make Harry believe that the Auror Training is worth at least a try, but with Harry’s confident answers he gives up quickly. 

 

“I guess now we have to come up with a plan for your future, don’t we,” he says, in the end, and it makes Harry’s heart dissolve completely. 

 

***

 

_ Tap tap tap tap tap.  _

 

Harry frowns in his sleep and shifts, only to squint the minute next. He opens his eyes irritatedly, but it shifts into surprise the moment he realizes that the sky is distant and azure, with no hint of a cloud anywhere, and a bright ray of sun cuts the air to hit the side of Harry’s pillow. 

 

_ Tap tap tap tap tap.  _

 

There’s also Sylvester tapping impatiently on the window. Harry smiles, reaching for his glasses, and rushes towards him. January air is particularly icy today, it’s as sharp as today’s sunlight, and bites Harry’s lungs when he breathes it in, but it’s hardly an unpleasant feeling. 

 

The lake’s icy surface is gleaming like a field of diamonds. There’s steam coming out of Harry’s chapped lips until he closes the window. Sylv smells like winter and his feathers are just a little bit rougher than usual to the touch. Harry’s breakfast under a Warming Charm and his morning dose of antibiotic potions are already set on the bedside table, and the bird flies off towards it as soon as Harry unties the letter. 

 

 

_ Potter,  _

_ You say your hatred for yourself is nothing but miserable and mine is a horrendous great deal, but with all due respect, Potter, you were right — we’re in the same fucking pit together. Who blames himself for having lost so much time? Who just can’t accept the chances he was given, while no one else was too? Who has a dead weight of hundreds of innocent people on his shoulders? But I’ll tell you this, Potter, I’ve never fought for the right thing. And it doesn’t matter how may times you tell me that I didn’t have a choice, that everyone makes mistakes and etcetera, we both know it’s bullshit. I had a choice and I made it, and it’s right there, on my left arm. You’re just...you can’t hate. You don’t do that, you’re too loyal, with your bloody saviour complex and a habit of taking pity on everyone. And as much as I enjoy being another charity project of yours, I’m afraid there’s nothing you can invest in. I’m a dead case, while you only payed your price for saving the whole Wizarding world. So do everyone a favour and stop torturing yourself for the things you barely had control of. This poisons you way more than you think. Everything happens for a reason.  _

_ D. L. M.  _

 

Now, Harry has never been a type to overreact. He’s never been the shy one, the one to blush all the time and make awkward moves, the one to burst into tears suddenly, but here we fucking are. 

 

He still doesn’t really understand why Draco Malfoy has such an impact on Harry, even after it’s been years since he’s fallen out of love with him. On the other hand, maybe it’s supposed to be like that. Maybe it’s a causal thing — maybe a heart is supposed to experience these kinds of vivid, painfully strong emotions towards someone it carried love for once. 

 

Harry can’t possibly know. Draco is the only one for him in many ways. Unfortunately. 

 

And due to this tornado of the bitter Slytherin truth, Harry almost misses the second piece of parchment in the envelope. It contains even less words than the first one, but is no less of a heartshaker. Especially considering that there was enough room for thrice a letter like this on the first parchment.

 

_ P. S. I’m sorry to hear you’re ill. Hope you’ll be better soon. Take care.  _

 

But with his despair rises determination. And, stimulated by care and compassion, stubbornness. Draco lets him talk. He tells him to shut up, but he listens, and although it’s yet another thing Harry doesn’t understand, like pretty much everything connected to the nature of his feelings towards Draco Malfoy, there’s no point in denying it’s there. And maybe, just maybe, he could be caring about Harry, too. 

 

So Harry speaks. 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> please do not hesitate and tell me if it sucks


	10. but it’s so hard my love

** Dear Draco,  **

** I’m writing this after getting your answer to my first letter but having already sent the second one, soo...can’t possibly know where it is going and it would probably be smart of me to wait until you answer my second letter as well but...I won’t.  **

** So. If you don’t think you’re worth shit and you will never be able to save anyone like i did — newsflash darling, you did it and you’re doing it again, right now. You did it at the Manor, and don’t even try to tell me you didn’t risk your life and your parents’ lives because you had always known what is right and what is wrong. You do it now, trying so fiercely to pull me out of my own head, and as much as I resist it, I admire your determination. I admire you in so many ways it frightens me sometimes. You said everything happens for a reason and, following this philosophy, if it wasn’t for the Death Eater stuff, you wouldn’t be a person you are now. You would be the same little spoiled shit belonging in hell knows where in this world but look at yourself now. You really are one of the fiercest people I know.  **

** And you know what? You saved me right after deciding to send an answer to my confession letter, and as much as I wouldn’t want you to know this, because I’ve never been particularly fond of the idea of satisfying your enormous fucking ego, I know this is the right time to let you know that our dialogue has weirdly helped me through all these apathetic and ugly months of not living but wasting time. Believe it or not, I used to find myself in a position I’m still not proud of, but unfortunately, the circumstances were above me. Yet, they no longer are. I feel that I’m in control. Brick by brick, I’m getting to it.  **

 

For Harry, it’s like swallowing his pride. It’s a different thing — saying how affected he is by Draco Malfoy to Draco Malfoy; because, in the end, he’s still Draco Malfoy. And he is Harry Potter. Harry Potter shouldn’t tell Draco Malfoy that he pulled him out of depression, because then Draco Malfoy’s enormous fucking ego will undoubtedly go the hell off.

 

But some cryptic voice, loud and clear right there in his head, tells Harry that maybe this explosion is just what Draco Malfoy needs. 

 

** I think all you’re trying to do is to convince yourself that you ain’t worth shit first, and on one hand, it’s bad, really bad, and I hate it; but on the other hand, I think if you use all the punches on me and I retort them all, sooner or later you’ll run out of them and maybe stop. Maybe. I don’t know. Maybe you’ll ignore my letters and I’ll go fuck myself. We’ll see. **

 

_ Come fuck me yourself if you’re not a coward.  _

 

Harry mentally gives himself a slap in the face. 

** Waiting impatiently for your answer to my second letter and not apologizing for not being able to send this one after getting it in order for us to not get even more confused,  **

** Harry  **

His thoughts are loud in the silence of the Hospital Wing. Even at the end of January no one is sick. The stars are bright, but they are mountains of indifference. 

 

***

 

The last day of January greets Harry with a runny nose and a dose of Pepper-Up, forced down his throat by Madam Pomfrey. 

 

“There’s no need for you to dramatize, darling, you’re good enough to go to classes,” she said, clearly unimpressed, before shoving the vial into his mouth and sending him off. 

 

“It’s weird when the last day of a month is also a Monday,” Harry sits down at the Gryffindor table just in time to hear Seamus speak. “I like it when the fifth day is Friday, though.” 

 

Dean closes his eyes, toast halfway to his mouth, and sighs. 

 

“Tell me what made you think that saying this would be a good idea.” 

 

Harry snorts. 

 

“Thought you liked the sound of my voice,” Seamus wiggles his eyebrows with the most shit-eating grin that could turn the most innocent sentence in a whorehouse special. 

 

“God,” Dean rolls his eyes, but the apples of his cheeks turn pink. 

 

“I don’t want to hear about it, I absolutely  _don’t_ ,” Ron pleads. 

 

“This is homophobic,” Seamus objects, “I never complain when you tell me about your sex life.” 

 

About twenty students burst into laughter, when Hermione and Ron’s faces turn equally red, and Harry triumphantly tries to understand who’s glance is more, like, murderous — Hermione’s at Ron or Ron’s at Seamus. 

 

But soon their owls arrive, and when Sylv gracefully lands on Harry’s shoulder without and letter, his heart sinks, although he tries to ignore the bitter weight of disappointment. Harry smiles sadly and lets the bird finish his porridge, and when he sneezes loudly, for the fourth time in five minutes, Luna’s cold hand is already covering his knuckles. 

 

“Oh Harry,” she says looking at him, and there’s a soft silver glistening to her eyes. “Let the next month be gentle to you.” 

 

Harry doesn’t know what to say. 

 

***

 

The first day of February is no different to Monday, and blunt white light of the sky feels like a personal offense to Harry. On Wednesday he’s gloomier than Snape’s portrait every time Harry visits Headmistress Mcgonagall’s office, and on Thursday morning he’s so angry he spills his tea all over himself. 

 

What pisses him off the most, he thinks as he walks back to their dorms to change his shirt, is that he doesn’t understand why everything suddenly sucks. He was fine, he was getting better, but right when he admitted this to himself, everything went down. Everything abruptly decided to fuck up. He’s irritable, he’s more rambunctious than ever, and he’s constantly tensed for reasons he clearly  _does not _ comprehend. 

 

He takes his seat in the class beside Ron, throwing daggers at the wall in front of him, and the most bitter part is, he knows damn well this fucking wall doesn’t deserve it. It’s just him. Not knowing what the hell is wrong is bloody frustrating. 

 

On the top of it all, Slughorn suddenly decides to make them brew fucking Amortentia. Harry wants to roar when there are soft giggles across the class and a faint blush to Ron’s cheeks. Come on, how annoying this could be. They’re not kids any more, what’s with this reaction on anything involving  _love_. It’s not real anyway. An obsession is the only thing you can get with the bloody potion. 

 

Treacle tart, broomstick handle and Ginny’s flowery perfume. Those are the things he remembers hearing the last time he smelled the potion. He won’t be surprised if nothing but the last piece have changed. Maybe the smell of Mr Diler’s tea will replace it. Not the sleeping tea but the strong Turkish one he got used to drinking at least once a week. 

 

Carried away with these thoughts, Harry cuts himself while chopping rose thorns. 

 

“I don’t know mate, maybe you should go back to Pomfrey. You’ve been way too tensed since Monday, it’s unhealthy,” Ron points out, and Harry can hardly stop himself from snapping. “On the other hand, it’s better than having an apathetic puppet for a friend, ya know,” he shrugs, glancing at Harry as if checking out his reaction. 

 

“What,” Harry breathes out, reluctantly letting Ron heal the cut. 

 

“Ya know, it’s just, you used to be much more...carried away before. Like sometimes I was not sure you were even there. With us, I mean. I think you were going through some kind of an emotional crisis, an now you’re fine. I mean, although these days you look like you’re gonna strangle anyone who talks to you, it’s still something.” 

 

This level of honesty can only be expected from Ron. Which probably means that it’s all true. Because Ron, although not the most observant of all, is exceptionally attentive towards the differences he sees in people he values the most. And his characterizations are often the closest to the real condition of things, also oddly enough. 

 

“You’re not mad at me, right?” he asks carefully, and Harry wants to melt inside this love he sees in his friend’s eyes. And slap himself for being an aggressive fuck. 

 

“No,” he shakes his heads, and sighs. “I’m not.” 

 

“Boys,” Slughorn shushes them for the second time, and they both continue doing their thing, buried deep inside their thoughts. 

 

 _ Going through some kind of an emotional crisis, and now you’re fine _ . What a pathetic fucking joke Harry’s life is. Oh and now he’s pitying himself. Great. Maybe he should talk to someone in order to not talk to himself. Maybe he should go see a therapist. Maybe—

 

Harry’s head rapidly jerks to the left when he hears a whirl of familiar perfume somewhere in Hermione’s direction. It was only a hint that gets lost in a second, in a moment, like the very beginning of a once favourite song, and Harry frowns in an attempt to identify it. 

 

“This smells like Hagrid’s herbal oil,” Ron announces then, making Harry turn his head back to him. He’s staring down at the weird plum-coloured substance in the cauldron, frowning. “And nothing like Hermione.” 

 

“So you secretly love Hagrid’s herbal oil?” Harry asks mockish-innocently. He breathes in and registers a soft oilishly-flowery smell, but nothing like he has just experienced. It calms him down immediately. 

 

“No, I don’t like Hagrid’s herbal oil,” Ron mimics, rolling up his eyes, but it only adds fire to Seamus’ two hellholes he has for eyes. 

 

“Well mate, who knows what you’ve been using Hagrid’s herbal oil—“ 

 

“Shut  up  you sick fuck!” Ron roars desperately, his face hotter and hotter every minute. 

 

“Boys! For Merlin’s sake!” 

 

Everyone around their table miserably fails to cover their laughs when Slughorn walks up to them, face unimpressed. 

 

“Let me see what you’ve managed to do,” he murmurs, looking into their cauldron. If possible, he looks even more displeased than before. “Gentlemen, this is unacceptable. Last minutes of class and you give me the best example of Erkley’s skin lotion!” his bushy eyebrows jump up in an exclamation. “I’m expecting two parchments with a careful description of the differences between the effect of powdered and crushed Moonstone in potions making by Monday.” 

 

Ron tsks and starts mumbling something about how he could’ve been finishing the first semester of Auror Training already—etcetera, etcetera, while Harry huffs out a small laugh and begins to clean up their desk. 

 

“...as if they’re gonna make me brew Amortentia. As if anyone ever’s gonna make me brew Amortentia,” Ron keeps murmuring in a rather loud voice, but it’s clear he’s not half as pissed off as he wants to look. 

 

“Mister Weasley, it’s not about the potion, it’s about you being able to follow a complex set of directions correctly,” Slughorn teases from the other part of the class. “Nice job, Miss Patil, but the shimmer should originally be closer to blue than to pink. Be more careful with the dosing of rose petals. Smells good, right?” 

 

Ron rolls his eyes. The classroom is annoyingly hot, and Harry hurries towards the shelves to put the ingredients away. 

 

“ ‘mione you ready?” he asks, hanging his bag on one shoulder, and the moment he steps into the space of Hermione’s desk, it hits him full-force. 

 

Cool, transparent smell of perfume on the delicate curve of the pale neck. And to be more specific — there are two spots beneath the ears where the fragrance is the strongest. It’s on the veiny inner wrists too, although Harry doesn’t remember learning this. The perfume is something wild, like bluebells, and cold, like a lake in the mountains, but it’s not all. A small hint of hair product. A disturbing droplet of ink. Almost nonexistent smell of sweet tea, but Harry thinks there is actually no smell of tea at all — just his imagination. And maybe the fact that those pale lips always looked less waxy after a cuppa.  _Tea-stained._

 

Oh, and sweat. Sweat on warm heated skin, soon to be washed away with herbal soap and water, but still strong on every inch of long angular body, on emerald-green Seeker’s robes; in silver hair, on pink temples, droplets of it crossing the fragile curve of collarbones, the back, the inner thighs. 

 

_ There should be nothing dreamy about sweat, sweat is actually disgusting.  _

 

But there are hundreds of different ways Draco Malfoy smells like, and Harry is too familiar with this encyclopedia. It’s the same as it was when he was first introduced to the potion a couple of years ago — and back then it was terrifying. It was too much. It was mind blowing. It hurt like a bitch. 

 

And nothing else is new.

 

Realization hits him like a train. And the worst part of finally acknowledging this love he’s been carrying in his exhausted heart this whole time is that this is only a ghost, not even a far outcry of the person. This is nothing but a small amount of liquid in a cauldron, and, like a petrifying blood-freezing agony, another realization hits Harry hard: he misses Draco. The absence of another boy beside him is unbearable, and Harry misses him, he  craves him like a drowning man craves air underwater. His lungs are burning, his heart is thumping, his body is paralyzed, but nothing is real except that one short moment it felt like he was right there, in the class, so far away and yet so near, and in a matter of a heartbeat it is gone, and Harry is alone again, alone with roaring in his ears and unbearable pain in his chest, longing for a person it seems like he’ll never manage to escape. 

 

How could he not know this. How could he forget. How could he think he has quit. 

 

“Harry are you alright?” Hermione’s voice is distant, like he’s already thirty feet deep in water. There’s a light touch to his hand he doesn’t really feel. 

 

“You look like you’ve just seen a ghost,” Ron chuckles at first, but after meeting Harry’s eyes his smile melts into a grimace of shock. “Bloody hell.” 

 

“I’m fine,” Harry tries to breathe out, but then the cauldron with Hermione’s potion is gone, at least ten pairs of eyes look at him curiously, and Ron’s insistent hand is dragging him out of the classroom. 

 

“Mate.” 

 

“I’m fine,” Harry repeats, voice a little stronger. “It’s just,” his breath comes out in a broken rhythm. “It was really hot in there.” 

 

“Harry!” 

 

Hermione flies out of the classroom door, it slams shut behind her, and then her body hits Harry’s, and her hands embrace him tightly, and her hair tickles his cheeks, and he just knows that she knows, he knows it and he can’t help but start shaking silently, fat bitter tears staining his pained face. 

 

***

 

“I’m sorry for earlier,” Harry says in the evening after a long depression nap he took as soon as Ron brought him back to the dorms. The three of them decided it would be a good idea to have a dinner in the kitchens since he missed it at the Great Hall. There’s a low murmur of House Elves around them, and burning wood crackles softly in the fireplace. 

 

“What are you apologizing for,” Ron managed to snort, mouthful of mashed potatoes. 

 

“Harry, please,” Hermione huffs out, busy cutting her steak into pieces. “We’re all allowed to have a little nervous breakdown time after time.” 

 

Harry actually laughs at this. 

 

“I’m the ugliest crier,” he shrugs and takes a bite of his treacle tart. “You should’ve never experienced it.” 

 

“I’m uglier,” Ron objects easily, and to Harry’s utmost delight, Hermione begins to nod eagerly. “I’m an absolutely terrible crier, you know this mate, don’t even start.” 

 

“Crying pretty is,” Hermione arches both her brows smugly, “a talent.” 

 

“Speaking of,” Ron says, forcing on an unimpressed expression. “We’re not going to talk about it since ignoring it completely is more comfortable to you mate, but it’s February 14th soon, and George managed to invent a fucked-up Amortentia-based perfume for all those pathetic lover boys and girls out there.” 

 

“Oh Merlin,” Hermione snorts. 

 

“Yeah. Percy’s already trying to sue him but I don’t think it’s gonna work so watch out. Don’t faint accidentally.” 

 

“And don’t open any letters that day. People can be really reckless.” 

 

Harry catches himself smiling softly, inspecting the crumbs on his plate. He still hasn’t had a moment to analyze today’s events, but he still has the whole night to himself. It’s easy to admit he’s reluctant to finish their meal, but. 

 

“It’s on Monday, right? Fuck,” he exhales, playing with the fork. "Is there any spell to block all the smells? Wouldn’t want to have a stroke in the middle of breakfast.” 

 

“We’ll work something out, Harry.”

 

“I wonder if anyone ever gets more Valentine Cards than Zabini used to get every year,” Ron says thoughtfully. “What? The fucker was really hot.” 

 

 _I’ve always been more into blonds_ , actually Harry thinks of adding, but something stops him. Something always stops him. One day though, when he’s completely honest with himself again, he’ll tell them too. If he manages the honesty part first. 

 

 


End file.
